August 2025

Braille Authority of North America Board Meeting 

Monday, August 18, 2025, 1:00 p.m. Eastern Time

1. Call to Order: Jen

Jen called the meeting to order at 1:01 P.M. Eastern Time. 

2. Roll Call: Amber Pearcy

The following board members were in attendance:

  • Jen Goulden, CNIB (Canadian National Institute for the Blind), Chair
  • Wendy Buckley, Perkins School for the Blind, Vice Chair
  • Amber Pearcy, National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled, Library of Congress (NLS), Secretary
  • Danette Johnson, Hadley, Treasurer
  • Marie Zaldivar, Alternate Text Production Center (ATPC)
  • Judy Dixon, American Council of the Blind (ACB)
  • Frances Mary (FM) D'Andrea, American Foundation for the Blind (AFB)
  • Kyle DeJute, American Printing House for the Blind (APH)
  • Mary Nelle McLennan (MN), Association for Education and Rehabilitation of the Blind and Visually Impaired (AER)
  • Tracy Gaines, California Transcribers and Educators for the Blind and Visually Impaired (CTEBVI)
  • Hollie Knight, Center for Inclusive Design and Innovation (CIDI)
  • Tina Seger, Clovernook Center for the Blind and Visually Impaired
  • Diane Spence, National Braille Association (NBA
  • Jennifer Dunnam, National Federation of the Blind (NFB)
  • Georgie Sydnor, National Braille Press (NBP)
  • Susan (Sue) Reilly, Administrative Assistant
  • Aquinas Pather, associate member Allyant

  • Emily Coleman, Associate Member Council of Schools and Services for the Blind (COSB)

  • Holly Bullock, associate member Crawford Technologies

3. Approval of Minutes From Last Meeting: Amber Pearcy

Amber reported that she sent the June meeting minutes to the board and received feedback. She then sent the minutes back to the board with the board’s feedback incorporated, after which no additional edits were suggested. 

MSC: Amber moved to approve the minutes from the June 23, 2025 meeting. Kyle seconded. Motion carried. 

4. Fall Meeting at NBP: Georgie Sydnor

Georgie reminded the board that the fall meeting will be held October 22-24, 2025 in Boston. The meeting will be held at Northeastern University. Georgie will send hotel information to the board. The last day to make reservations at the hotel is September 22, 2025.

5. ICEB Update: Frances Mary D’Andrea / Judy Dixon

The new ICEB website is under development. 

There are a small number of errata items being prepared for The Rules of Unified English Braille 2024. 

The ICEB midterm meeting will be held from June 22-26, 2026 in Watertown, MA at the Perkins School for the Blind.

The Executive Committee approved the recommended updates to section 1.7 of The Guidelines for Technical Material 2014. It will be posted to the website; an announcement will be forthcoming.

The IPA is being updated. Readers may emboss the portions of this document containing tactile graphics on ViewPlus, Enabling, and InDex embossers.

6. Standardized Tests: Kyle DeJute / Frances Mary D’Andrea

There were no updates from this committee.

7. GCUEB: Wendy Buckley 

Wendy reported that the ICEB communication draft recommendation was sent to the board, and one minor edit was made based on feedback. Wendy reminded the board that this document was created in response to the process of updating The Guidelines for Technical Material 2014 in hopes of improving communication between the ICEB representatives and BANA during future updates. The committee would like to see this document added to the Policies and Procedures manual.

MSC: Wendy moved to accept the procedure to establish the BANA ICEB communication process. Mary Nelle seconded. Motion carried. 

MSC: Jennifer moved to charge the bylaws committee to incorporate the ICEB communication process document into the BANA bylaws and policies where applicable. Wendy seconded. Motion carried.

8. Chemistry Committee: FM D’Andrea

FM reported that the chemistry committee has created an errata to the document Chemical Notation Using the Nemeth Braille Code 2023. This will supersede the first errata which was sent to the board, and FM will send the new version to the board. The board will review the document and hold a vote at the September meeting.

9. Braille Formats: Hollie Knight 

Hollie reported that the committee would like to know if a change log is necessary for this update to the formats guidelines. Jennifer responded that in the case of a long document, it is particularly important to track the changes.

Hollie sent the committee’s proposed changes to the section about headings and the section about lists to the board for approval.

The board is in favor of the committee’s recommendation to add a provision for the use of cell-9 headings where a larger hierarchy of division is needed. Kyle suggested making the new section on cell-9 headings match the rest of the heading language in the section                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                   

MSC: Kyle moved to grant preapproval for the formats committee to include the concept of ccell-9 headings in the update to Braille Formats: Principles of Print-to-Braille Transcription, 2016. Danette seconded. Motion carried.

The committee has proposed a change to the section on columnar lists which would allow for the use of two or more guide dots between columns even if they are unrelated. The committee does not believe that transcribers should be in the position of deciding whether columns are related. 

The board would like more information before making the decision to pre-approve this change. There is agreement that guide dots in a list could cause more confusion for readers who may believe that the columns are related. 

General Consensus: The board encourages the committee to narrow the scope of this change and make this applicable only to tables rather than multi-column lists. We would like to see their revised proposal. 

10. Production updates from APH: Kyle DeJute

Kyle reported that there are no updates at this time.

11. Awards Committee: FM D’Andre 

FM reported that no nominations were received by the committee. The committee is planning to meet soon to decide how to move forward.

12. Membership Committee: Jen Goulden

Jen informed the board that a new chair needs to be appointed for the Membership Committee. Jen will address this in September.  

13. Next Meeting: Jen Goulden

The next teleconference will be held on September 22, 2025 at 1:00 P.M. Eastern time. 

14. Spring 2026 Meeting: FM D’Andrea

FM reported that she will soon have conversations with the director of AFB to determine whether the meeting will be held in Washington, D.C., where AFB is headquartered, or if it will be held in her hometown of Pittsburgh.

15. Adjournment: Jen Goulden

Jen adjourned the meeting at 2:00 P.M. Eastern Time.

Upcoming Meetings:

  • Spring 2026: AFB
  • Fall 2026: CIDI
  • Spring 2027: CTEBVI
  • Fall 2027: Hadley
  • Spring 2028: ATPC
  • Fall 2028: ACB
  • Spring 2029: CNIB
  • Fall 2029: Clovernook
  • Spring 2030: NFB
  • Fall 2030: NLS
  • Spring 2031: Perkins
  • Fall 2031: NBA
  • Spring 2032: APH

Respectfully submitted,

Amber Pearcy

September 10, 2025