International Council on English Braille (ICEB)

NEWS

ICEB 2008 General Assembly

The 4th ICEB General Assembly was held in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, April 6th through 10th, 2008. Highlights of the Assembly included positive progress reports from the four countries that have adopted Unified English Braille (UEB), and the completion of a new braille code for the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). (See IPA Braille.) The proceedings were streamed live by ACB Radio on its World Channel (www.acbradio.org/world). See below for links to the resolutions of this and prior General Assemblies.

Moving towards UEB

As of the April 2006 Executive Committee meeting that took place in Worcester, South Africa, four countries were in the process of implementing UEB: Australia, New Zealand, Nigeria and South Africa. Other countries were in various stages of consideration. See the RNIB Position on Unified English Braille issued in May 2006 by the Royal National Institute for the Blind, of the United Kingdom.

At the 12th World Conference of the International Council for Education of People with Visual Impairment (ICEVI) in July 2006, William Jolley of Australia, ICEB's Public Relations Officer, presented a paper entitled "Unified English Braille: A Literacy Bedrock in the Digital Age". The Conference subsequently passed a resolution endorsing the adoption of UEB as an international standard.

Purpose and General Organization of the ICEB

The purpose of the International Council on English Braille is to coordinate and improve standards for braille usage for all English-speaking users of braille. The members of the ICEB are the various countries where English is spoken (and membership is open to all such countries); representatives to ICEB are named by the accepted authorities that set braille standards within those countries. The present membership includes:

• Australia
• Canada
• New Zealand
• Nigeria
• South Africa
• United Kingdom
• United States

The ICEB General Assembly meets every four years, the most recent having been held in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia in April 2008. Previous General Assemblies had been held in Canada (2004), the USA (1999) and the UK (1995).

The ICEB's Executive Committee meets continuously by e-mail, in person immediately before and after each General Assembly, and at an interim meeting approximately midway between successive General Assemblies.

The ICEB Constitution was adopted May 31, 1991.

ICEB General Assembly Resolutions

• 2008 General Assembly Resolutions
• 2004 General Assembly Resolutions
• 1999 General Assembly Resolutions

ICEB Projects

• Unified English Braille Code: The largest project of the ICEB has been to develop a single Unified English Braille Code (UEB or UEBC) for both literary and technical purposes throughout the English-speaking world. See UEB Project Information.
• IPA Braille: This project, carried out under the auspices of the UEB Linguistics Committee, has produced a recommended standard braille code for the International Phonetic Alphabet. See IPA Braille.
• 8-dot Braille Code: This project is to define a standard 8-dot braille code. See 8-Dot Project Information.
• Tactile Graphics: This project is to coordinate research and write guidelines for the production of tactile graphics and related teaching methods. See Tactile Graphics Project Information.

Discussion List

There is a discussion list, open to all who are interested, on English Braille Codes and related topics -- with particular emphasis on matters pertaining to ICEB's technical projects (e.g. how well UEB or other codes work for representing technical notation, or for translation by computer). The list is named "icebrl". To join it, create a message with the word

subscribe

in the subject and email the message to icebrl-request@freelists.org. Please follow the instructions that you receive by e-mail thereafter. (Alternatively, you may visit http://www.freelists.org to subscribe, unsubscribe, set vacation mode or other options through a Web form. An archive for icebrl is also maintained at that site.)

Each ICEB working committee also maintains a list for its deliberations; follow the information links under "ICEB Projects," above.

Further Information

For further information about the ICEB, see ICEB contact information.

See also the current ICEB Brochure for a more complete mission statement, information on activities and sources of funding, and other ways of contacting ICEB.

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