A group of university students is contributing to addressing a social challenge – creating jobs for people who are blind or have low vision in South Korea.
According to the Korea Employment Agency for Persons With Disabilities, blind people’s employment rate stood at 42.6 percent last year.
The employment rate for people with severe vision disabilities remains very low at 19.1 percent, with most serving as massage therapists. In other words, they have a limited choice in jobs.
The ‘Bom Geuneul (meaning ‘spring shade’) Cooperative’ organized by a group of Seoul National University (SNU) students, created a new job for the visually impaired in 2018, the Koreabizwire reported.
The newly created job is ‘Blind Mental Care,’ a psychological consultation service offered in the dark by visually impaired persons accustomed to the darkness and have sensitive hearing.
The Blind Mental Care service can provide new jobs to blind people while offering mental care to those who are exposed to extreme stress.
This psychological consultation service is conducted between the customer and blind people’s mental caregiver in a blocked room from all light. To guarantee anonymity, only nicknames are used in the room.
Despite a short history of fewer than two years, the service has attracted significant attention, with the number of customers estimated to have exceeded 250.
