This is being provided in a rough-draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings.
MARK RICCOBONO: Greetings, fellow Federationists, today is Thursday, May 30th, 2024, and this is Presidential Release number 539. The National Federation of the Blind advances the lives of our members and all blind people in the United States. We know that blindness is not the characteristic that defines us or our future and every day we raise the expectations for blind people because we recognize the low expectations create obstacles between blind people and our dreams.
Our collective power, determination and diversity achieve the aspirations of all blind people, and I thought it was appropriate to start this final Presidential Release before the National Convention with our belief statement in the National Federation of the Blind, and we get together here in our NFB of Utah Auditorium to host this Presidential Release, we are hosting our first ever IEP Advocacy Academy from today through June 1st, and we have with us in the audience our first cohort of advocates in training. So welcome to all of you.
(Cheers)
The goal of this program is to increase the number of advocates available to help families through the IEP process, but equally as important to connect them with the network that is the National Federation of the Blind. So thank you to our advocates, and there will be future cohorts that will be training, so please, if you are interested, you know, stay tuned, because there will be definitely many more opportunities. And speaking of opportunities, I want to thank our affiliates across the country that are getting ready to host or have hosted NFB BELL Academies or STEM 2U programs either in May or June, that includes Arizona, Tennessee, Louisiana, Missouri, New Mexico, Utah, Ohio, Texas, Alabama, Virginia and Maryland will all be hosting Bell programs.
Thank you to Oregon, New Jersey, Arizona and Michigan for hosting STEM 2U programs coming up. So the work of the Federation is truly busy as we lead up to the National Convention. Things haven't slowed down a bit. To all of those hosting youth programs, I want to say we would love to have some recorded customary ends for the Presidential Release from these programs. Now, we are heading into June, and June is designated as Pride Month. This is a time to celebrate and commemorate the LGBTQ+ communities around the world.
And it's true in the National Federation of the Blind where many of our members have intersecting identities that we use this as an opportunity to celebrate Pride Month as well. We celebrate each other for who we are in the National Federation of the Blind, and one of our goals is to make sure that all of us as blind people can bring all of our selves to the organized blind movement.
And one of our core values in this movement is to foster inclusion. We work to cultivate an environment that is welcoming and inclusive for all individuals, and that challenges us sometimes to think differently about how we can make our space more inclusive, but it really creates opportunities for us, because it truly does allow us to be the best organization that we can be, and one of the components of that is to provide a loving and supporting and encouraging community for all blind people. And that is a gift that all of us share in this movement that a lot of people wish they had.
And so as we enter Pride Month 2024, I think we should reflect on how fortunate we are to be part of such a diverse and welcoming organization, and to continue to strive to make it even more so every day. Now, I do want to use this opportunity to lift up the fact that we do have an NFB LGBTQ group in the National Federation of the Blind, and if you are interested in being part of the group, you can email Sanho Steele Louchart and he would be pleased to get you connected with the group. His email is [email protected]. Now, talking about Pride Month brings me closer to the National Convention, but before we get to talking about the convention, I want to recognize that about this time last year a number of our LGBTQ members raised concerns about the various locations where we host our national convention.
And the National Board last June knew that we would be coming to Florida in 2024 and grappled with the difficulty of having a convention in a place where the laws had changed and really presented some concerns for a number of our members, and our board gave this a lot of thoughtful consideration, knowing that it was really not going to be a possibility to change our convention.
I worked very closely with our LGBTQ group to think about how we might put some things in place that could enhance the experience of being in Florida, and maybe create some new connections for our organization, and this truly has created an opportunity for us to connect with some organizations that are in their own rights doing great work, great civil rights work for other communities outside of working with blind people.
And one of those organizations that we have had the pleasure to connect with is Equality Florida. Equality Florida is the largest civil rights organization dedicated to securing full equality for Florida's LGBTQ community. And as part of our effort to connect with other organizations, we were really pleased to find Equality Florida. It's always a true honor to connect in a real way with other civil rights organizations because we can learn from the wisdom that they bring to the civil rights activities, and it's really a great opportunity for them to also learn from the work of the organized blind movement.
So on this release, as we go into Pride Month, I would like to invite to the Presidential Release an individual from Equality Florida for some brief remarks. This is Jon Harris Maurer. No relation to Mark Maurer, but Jon Harris Maurer, who is Equality Florida's public policy director. He is a lawyer, and he serves as someone on the frontlines doing lobbying work for the LGBTQ equality effort in the state of Florida, and he has been involved with us as we have undertaken building this relationship with Equality Florida.
So Jon Harris, are you out there?
JON HARRIS MAURER: I am, President Riccobono. Thank you for having me.
MARK RICCOBONO: Welcome. The floor is yours.
JON HARRIS MAURER: Thank you again, my name is Jon Harris Maurer. As President Riccobono mentioned, I saw the reference to past president Maurer on the website and got me curious about family connection there, maybe farther back in the family tree that I'm aware of. But I am very honored to be with you tonight. I've had some conversations already with President Riccobono, with Sanho and some of the other sort of interested stakeholders, and I'm glad to have had this opportunity to learn a little bit more about the National Federation of the Blind and talk about what we are seeing in Florida.
As mentioned, I'm our Public Policy Director. That basically means I'm the frontline lobbyists for Equality Florida in the capital, and we do local policy work around the state. In addition, we're working to secure full equality for Florida's LGBTQ community through public education, grassroots mobilization and direct policy work. If folks have been following the news, certainly for members in Florida, I'm sure they're aware, that has been a challenging task in Florida the last few years. Our 2023 legislative session in particular really focused a lot on LGBTQ issues. I am happy and I'll say relieved to report that we have now concluded the 2024 legislative session in Florida and Equality Florida helped defeat or neutralize 21 out of 22 anti-LGBTQ bills.
So that in conjunction with a settlement agreement around litigation that had been pending for about two years on the so called "Don't Say Gay Or Trans" legislation has helped us feel like we're seeing the tide turning in Florida. I can't say that we have undone all the significant harms that we saw legislated in 2023 and some prior years.
So there's certainly a lot more to go, and we understand why folks certainly have concerns about being in Florida or visiting Florida, and your National Conference is not the only place by any stretch that we have heard those concerns.
And I was really excited, actually, talking to Sanho and looking at our list of recommendations on sort of best practices for organizations coming to Florida, that it really sounds like a lot of those are already in place before we even connected. So kudos to y'all for having that group and being so thoughtful about this. I mentioned, you know, a lot of legislation we have seen recently. Much of that is probably not applicable to folks' experience, if they're just sort of in the state briefly for a conference or visiting. That doesn't mean there are no implications. I know one of the pieces of legislation in particular that we focused on is basically the anti trans bathroom bill. A lot of concern about that.
And as originally introduced, it was incredibly sweeping in its reach. I'm very glad to share that through a lot of legislative advocacy it was significantly narrowed. So while it does still very much remain in effect and on the books, it only applies in educational institutions, correctional institutions, and government owned or leased buildings. So that's not nothing. You know, it still means it applies in an airport that you might be passing through, but it is not something that is going to apply at every retail establishment, every hotel or venue that you may be in.
So I think there are probably other opportunities to get sort of more in the weeds on some of those issues and answer any questions that folks may have. Equality Florida, again, is really excited about being engaged here and very happy to be a resource and help folks understand you know, what it is like to be sort of on the ground in Florida. As I mentioned, a lot of those impacts may not be something that you feel visiting for a few days when you look at things like what is going on in our education system or in our healthcare system. But happy to talk about those sorts of -- in more detail we have provided resources already that I'm sure can be made to available to anybody who is interested. Civil rights organization, we're happy to make these connections with another and just be of service.
MARK RICCOBONO: Jon Harris, appreciate you being with us and I know Equality Florida is available to any of our members that may have questions or concerns, and we'll make sure that people can get those contacts, and I want to publicly thank Equality Florida for helping educate our convention ally network that we are building for those who may want an ally to be with them in their accessing the convention in Florida, so that training -- the first round of training happened.
So we really appreciate not simply the information but Equality Florida really working alongside us to make sure that our fulfillment of our value of fostering inclusion is really happening. Thank you for that and thank you for your work. We hope that you will get to meet you in Florida at our convention in July. And I should say... Happy Pride Month.
JON HARRIS MAURER: Thank you and best of luck with the convention.
MARK RICCOBONO: Thank you. Appreciate it. One of the reasons to have Equality Florida on this Presidential Release is to talk about the National Convention, and one of the things that we have done is created a partnership with an organization called Social Offset, and this offers our attendees and supporters of the National Federation of the Blind who are coming to the convention an important opportunity to offset some of the harm that they may feel is being done by going to the state of Florida and contributing taxes to the base of the state. Social Offset is a platform that helps organizations put together campaigns. It vets organizations and allows individuals to make donations, 100% of which go to those vetted organizations that are doing good work on the ground to combat some of the local and state public policies that might not align with values that people have.
So we think this is a great opportunity for us. Social Offset is a new organization. In fact, one of the principal co founders works right here in Catonsville, Maryland. So our Social Offset campaign for 2024 allows you to designate a contribution to one of two organizations. One of them is Equality Florida, and the other is Florida Legal Services, which is a statewide leader in advocating for economic, social, and racial justice in the state of Florida.
You can find more information about the Social Offset opportunity at our website, NFB.org/convention, and you will certainly find it in our convention emails that will be coming out. And this one more opportunity for me to remind you that you can still sign up to be part of our Convention Ally Network and thank you to those who have already done so. Now, I have got to move on to a number of other convention items. First of all, convention registration is still open for about another day online. You can register at the online price of 25 dollars, but that is going to close at the end of May.
So after that, if you want to register in person at the convention, you will be able to do so, but it will cost you 5 dollars more. However, if you are unable to attend the convention, you can and should register for our virtual convention experience. And that registration is open now and will remain open through a good portion of the convention. Of course, if you register early, you get better access to information, the communications, that sort of thing. The virtual convention experience option offers access to preconvention activities, exclusive virtual sessions during convention.
Also you get access to the convention app, to the streaming of the sessions and to preconvention activities, and there are, of course, virtual door prizes as well. So there is a number of great benefits to the virtual convention experience. There are costs involved with the virtual convention experience, and what we are trying to do there. And so this year we are asking for a 10 dollar registration fee for the virtual convention experience, a flat fee regardless of when you sign up. There are more than 40 hours of content available through the virtual convention experience. So a lot of great stuff there.
I do encourage you, if you can't be with us in Florida for whatever reason, to register for the convention experience and fully participate as much as possible. Now, I do have a few days left before this deadline hits, so I want to give you one more reminder, for those tuned in live, that convention resolutions will be due within the next week. Our resolutions chairman is David Porterfield from Arizona, and he wants you to know that we are currently accepting proposed resolutions for this year's convention. They must be email to the committee at [email protected].
And the deadline to submit a resolution is Tuesday, June 4 at midnight Eastern time. A couple other quick reminders about the convention. There are a lot of volunteer opportunities available to help with the convention. I mentioned the convention Ally Network, but you can sign up to be a convention ambassador. You can help out in the Independence Market. There are many opportunities. And the convention does run because hundreds of individuals jump in to help. Our convention is known as an efficient operation, and that's because we have a great team of individuals working on it. One of the ways that we enhance the work we do during the convention and even leading up to the convention is promote it in social media. I notice a lot of people already on social media are using our hashtag, which this year is #NFB24.
So please take the opportunity to put that in your posts, regardless of what network it's on, to promote, as you are getting ready, what you are excited about, what you are hoping to accomplish, the things that you are interested in, the people you want to connect with. It's a great way to boost the work that we're doing. So final opportunity before the convention to say, everything convention at NFB.org/convention.
Now, the last Presidential Release we talked about that Dream Big Give 25 Drive. This is our annual campaign to encourage donations to the National Federation of the Blind and this year's effort is really exciting, because as you promote contributions to the National Federation of the Blind, you've got a shot to win some very cool things. And the new twists we put on it is really fantastic. First of all we launched the Dream Big Give 25 Drive on May 16th, which was Global Accessibility Awareness Day. As we announced on the last release, the big prize for those who contribute to the drive is a Monarch, which is the most innovative tactile graphics and Braille display available anywhere in the world, and you can be one of the first people to get your hands on it, and actually own it.
Now this year we have done some really cool things to make it possible for our members to do some peer to beer fundraising with your friends and family. You can reach out and you can get additional chances to win, because if someone makes a donation and designates you as the person they want to honor with their contribution, you will get an additional entry into our Give 25 Drive drawing for the Monarch or a trip to our 2025 convention. And there's other alternatives. And I happen to know there is going to be some pretty nifty other contribution benefits that you might be able to take advantage of at the convention. Now, it's nice for us to give.
But if we can get the word out and get others to give, that is where the real power is going to come in this. And especially with the monarch being available, we should be getting families and teachers and all sorts of people to give and honor individuals in their giving, so that they have an opportunity to win the monarch. I'm very excited about this. I think these dollars are going to create tremendous opportunities for our educational programs and the advocacy work we want to do in the National Federation of the Blind. NFB.org/give25donate is the page for the campaign.
So give25donate, all one word. Spread it around and get people to give. Encourage them to use your name so that you get entered into our drawing. It's going to be exciting to see who gets the Monarch at our National Convention. Now, as part of our National Convention, it means that we focus all of our resources on making sure the convention is great, and one of the things we will be doing as a result is closing down our Independence Market so that we can bring it to the Convention. So I want to let you know that our Independence Market will be closed from Monday, July 1st, through Friday July 12.
So you will have to go to the exhibit hall during the time the convention is open to get to the market, but if you do want to reach out to you to order things, your last opportunity before the convention will be Friday June 28th, of course, and then the market will not be open again until -- and taking calls until Monday, July 15th. I have exciting advocacy news for us on this release. I want to congratulate all Federationists on a job well done, because our tremendous advocacy work over the past few weeks did pay off because the Senate and House of Representatives passed HR3935 that reauthorized the legislation work for the next five years.
And the FAA reauthorization was signed by President Biden on May 16th. And specifically it includes a number of accessibility provisions that benefit blind people and other disabled travelers. These include training requirements for assisting passengers with disabilities, better access standards for the accessibility of in-flight entertainment. Also improved access to airline websites. The bill also initiates a pilot program for air passengers to register their service animals, which eliminates the problems that blind people and others have faced with completing paperwork with some of the airlines.
So these are great provisions and Congress heard from many, many blind people across the country about this bill, so congratulations to us on getting that work done. As many other pieces of legislation that continue to move through Congress, but at the same time we are pushing on the regulatory front, and on May 23rd, we did submit comments to the Department of Transportation regarding its continue use of the forms to register service animals with the airlines.
We have continued to push back on those provisions even as this bill makes its way through Congress. Hopefully the new system will help, but we have continued to advocate very strongly with the Department of Transportation about our opposition to the work that they are doing, and our comments are making a difference there. Now, you can read all of our policy comments on our policy statements page at NFB.org, and you can also read the full text of our press releases by going to the press room page on our website. We publish all of these things on a regular basis.
So any time you are looking for the work that we are doing, you'll find it at NFB.org. Now, a lot of work happens in the Federation because of great members who are volunteers. But we also have the best staff anywhere around, and we have a number of openings for new staff members here at the National Federation of the Blind. So going into our convention I want to call that to your attention. We are looking for folks in our communications area related to technology. We also will be posting a couple other positions before we get to the convention. We're looking for a deputy director for our NEWSLINE program. You can learn about all these positions on our website on the careers page. I encourage you to apply.
And if you are coming to the National Convention Career Fair, you will certainly find our table there and can learn more about the work that you could do here through our national office.
Okay, there is a lot of advocacy work to talk about, and this is kind of a big moment. On May 20th, 2024, I, along with the president of Source America sent a joint letter to Congress urging Congress to support both the house and the Senate to support the transition to Competitive Integrated Employment Act. Why is this significant?
Well, Source America has historically been the biggest employer network using the provisions in federal law that permit paying people with disabilities subminimum wages. You may recall that on the 10th anniversary we actually protested outside of Source America, but last week we sent a joint letter where Source America they are for the elimination of subminimum wages forever in this country. That is really huge. And that is because of the work that all of you have done to continue to push on this issue. Congress, it wasn't news to them that they were for the bill, but having Source America declare it in writing to Congress is an important moment that we should all feel good about.
Other advocacy work we have been doing, many blind people over the last month have been concerned about inaccessibility issues that have cropped up regarding their purchase of Sonos speakers. I happen to own Sonos myself at home. And we do use a Sonos controller here at the national office. Sonos issued a redesigned app, which besides being horrible for all customers, broke accessibility, and so we -- the National Federation of the Blind put out a statement and also reached out to Sonos about this. We feel it's very important, obviously, that companies that are the building technologies, make sure that they're not releasing any updates that completely make their products unusable by blind people.
This is a threat that we face on a day-to-day basis when our phones or other systems ask us to update app. We have to wonder if we will no longer be able to use the services that we have been able to use because someone didn't think about and prioritize accessibility in their quality assurance program. Now, Sonos, I guess to their credit, has been engaging with the National Federation of the Blind and you will find in the June Braille monitor a miniature about how you can join the Sonos Beta Program. This is a good example of our advocacy work. It's been very helpful to have members who are using these products do outreach.
So good opportunity to remind you that we have a toolkit related to web accessibility and app accessibility and you should continue to coordinate the outreach that you do on an individual basis through our national office so that we can bring things like the Sonos situation to scale, and hopefully in the end we'll actually see better products because companies like Sonos will start enculturating accessibility. I did want to also mention that earlier this month we did release our press release announcing our 2024 scholarship class for the National Federation of the Blind. Always an exciting time. I hope you have a chance to read the press release. Very impressive group of individuals that will represent the Federation at our convention. I'm looking forward to meeting all of them and learning more about their career aspirations and how they are going to change and benefit the organized blind movement through their work in a dynamic set of careers.
So congratulations to our 2024 finalists. Now, before I get to some Federation family notes, I do want to acknowledge the NFB of South Carolina, Charleston Chapter as being the newest chapter participating in our preauthorized contribution program. It's a way for you to give to the Federation on a monthly basis. Thank you to NFB of South Carolina. I know we have an NFB South Carolina member here in our audience. So thank you for that. You can applaud. That's okay.
(Applause)
Now, I do have a number of Federation family notes to share with you on this release before we wrap up, and the first of those is from Mississippi where we learned of the passing of Leta Boykin, who was a veteran, United States veteran, and a member of the at large chapter in Mississippi. From Virginia we learned of the recent passing of two members of the Greater Williamsburg Chapter of the NFB of Virginia. The first was Al McKenney, who passed away earlier this year. Al was the oldest member of the chapter. He was 99 ½ years old when he passed away.
And it's no joke to say he was the oldest member. He was also very, very active right up until his passing, most notably he was right out front leading the charge during the Blind Equality Achievement Month Walk last October. We also are saddened to learn of the passing of William T. Jones on April 13th. He was a founding member of the Greater Williamsburg Chapter. He was a fixture at chapter events, Virginia affiliate events and convention and our National Convention. He also served in the United States marine Corporation and ran a successful janitorial service company. His company focused on churches in the Williamsburg area. He was very committed to his wife Corlis, his family, the Pittsburgh Steelers, and our NFB community. So both of these Federationists will be sorely missed.
From Louisiana, we have learned of the passing of Daniel Taverne, who passed away on April 25th. Daniel was an active member of our Greater Ouachita Chapter in Louisiana. We also learned of the passing of Queen Franklin, who was only 30 years old and a member of the Greater New Orleans Chapter of the National Federation of the Blind of Louisiana. Queen passed away on May 10th.
Please keep all of these individuals in your thoughts and prayers, and also those that I may not have known about. However, am very happy to share the news that the National Federation of the Blind of Louisiana is pleased to welcome its newest member Julia Ann Gilbeaux, who was born on May 10th, weighing in at 7 pounds, 6 ounces, 20 inches long. Amelia Gilbeaux is one of the BELL rockstars in Louisiana, and she is very excited to welcome her little sister. Amber and Logan Gilbeaux are active members of the Louisiana Parents of Blind Children Division, where Amber serves on the board. Amber also was part of our Parent Leadership Program this year, and I'm told that the family is all doing well, and so I, along with the Louisiana family would like to welcome Julia as the newest member of the National Federation of the Blind. Pam, I think that's what I've got for now.
PAM ALLEN: All right, thank you so much.
MARK RICCOBONO: Good note to end on.
PAM ALLEN: I know, exciting. We're starting our BELL Academy, so our rock stars will be here in just a couple of days. Always exciting. So it's always wonderful when we have a live audience for our questions. So I understand we have some
MARK RICCOBONO: It's also very scary.
PAM ALLEN: Yeah, I know, exactly. No pressure. No pressure. (chuckling)
So thank you, Stephanie. Stephanie is going to be -- we have some great questions lined up, so we're going to kick it off.
SPEAKER: Hello, everyone. I'm from Michigan. Shout out to all of my Michigan people who are listening to the release. I have a question. So I'm -- Michigan was one of the first affiliates to get their website restructured and integrated into the new system, and, you know, I spent many a meetings with Stephanie and her great team, just kind of getting things on track, and I was just wondering what the status of moving all of the other affiliates was to the new website system.
MARK RICCOBONO: That's a great question. You know, first of all, for a little context for folks, for a long time we have had various systems for managing websites across our affiliates, and there came a time when we recognized that we needed to put some better supports in place, to have more consistency across our organization, as we started down this path, now many years ago, and it sounds simple, but we have very complicated websites, our affiliates have varying levels of technical expertise and programs.
So it actually is quite complicated, so your question is a good one. We have about 18 affiliates and national divisions that are still yet to move to the new system. And this just shows you how technology moves. We actually are using Drupal and have now moved up to versions of the Drupal software during this process so this will probably be an ongoing effort for us, but I think we're benefiting a lot by the consistency and also the community of practice.
Folks in our affiliates that can share expertise on using the Drupal system. And one of the great things that happens with Drupal is that because we are all using it, we can contribute back feedback on accessibility that gets built into the system going forward, and we saw that with a recent release of Drupal platform template that was named after Rachel Oliveira who was director of organizational technology here at one time. So you can use the Oliveira theme on an NFB website now.
PAM ALLEN: That's awesome. That's pretty cool. Thank you. We recently did our transition over to the new platform. It's been great. So thanks to the great team for helping to make it so seamless as well.
MARK RICCOBONO: I'm just glad they didn't ask how to do it, because I have no clue.
(Laughter)
PAM ALLEN: So our next question is from Shannon.
SHANNON: How's it going? My question is actually... how do you do it?
(Laughter)
MARK RICCOBONO: Do what? Which "it" do you want to know about?
SHANNON: Whatever you don't want to answer. I'm kidding.
(chuckles)
I'm along here with the team, the very first IEP advocacy crew, and super excited about that. My question is, what does it mean to be an effective advocate as well who can be that effective advocate?
MARK RICCOBONO: That's a great question. You know, first of all, anybody can be an advocate, and advocates take many different forms. And our goal in the National Federation of the Blind first and foremost is to train each of us to be an advocate. It's hard to advocate for anybody else if you're not willing to advocate for yourself. And so I would say to be an effective advocate you first have to be yourself and be prepared to advocate for yourself. It's not good enough to just go out and do things for others. You have to be willing to make sure that you are the best "you" that you can be and have the right opportunities. In my opinion, advocacy is a mixture of many things.
But first and foremost, it's about believing in the people that you are advocating for. And in our case with blind people, you have to believe in blind people. And some people, oh, that sounds silly, but we know that there are so many things that happen out there, because people just don't believe in blind people. And part of believing in blind people is sometimes challenging our own assumptions about things.
The second thing I would say is to be an effective advocate, it's not just about being the loudest one in the room., and John Perea has a great way of talking about being persuasive and polite. I think an effective advocate knows what the objective is, but also can read the people in the room, to know who the allies are and who are the enemies. And sometimes that means surprising people, by thanking them when they view themselves as the enemy. So it's a complicated question, but I think it starts with all of us understanding that any of us can and should be an advocate first and foremost for ourselves and then to use that lived experience to help lift up others in the process.
PAM ALLEN: Great questions. Thank you so much, Shannon. And we also have our next question that is going to be coming from Linda.
LINDA: So I need to know, it's important... where do I acquire a power showdown.
(Laughter)
MARK RICCOBONO: So for those who don't know what Power Showdown is, it was actually invented in the '60s, and it's basically the best way to describe it is it's a combination of air hockey without the hair, and Ping Pong without the net you are trying to hit the ball over. It's basically like air hockey with an oversized Ping Pong ball. It's much bigger overseas in Europe and Asia. Never caught on in the U.S. There are a number of places to get these tables made, but they're generally outside of this country.
So if anybody truly wants one, we can let you know what manufacturer we worked with, although they're not the only one out there. We don't have any exclusivity, but if you want one, they're 12 feet long and quite heavy. So you got to have some space, but as I noticed by this crowd here, it's a quite addictive game.
PAM ALLEN: Excellent. A lot of chatter about that. Thank you. Excellent. Thank you so much to our audience. It's such an exciting weekend for everyone to be there for this first class of our advocates. Thank you so much for the great questions. And President Riccobono, I think we have time for one more question. You referenced the Independence Market, and we had some questions about any updates on the online presence for Independence Market, and also where can people purchase NFB clothes like what you are modeling tonight?
MARK RICCOBONO: (laughing) Well, thank you. So first of all, we do have a number of NFB apparel items in the Independence Market. We try not to have too many, though, because a lot of our affiliates love to sell apparel at the National Convention, so that is often a great place to pick some things up. But you can get some things in the Independence Market catalog here at the national office.
So eCommerce for the Independence Market is a longstanding question that comes up on the release from time to time. What I will say is that you will have a definitive answer to this question at the National Convention. How's that?
PAM ALLEN: Ooh, exciting. Excellent. We also had a question about where can people send in customary endings?
MARK RICCOBONO: Customary endings you can definitely send to the office of the president. [email protected]. Would love to have them, especially if they're recorded by kids. It can be just a voice memo, which is fine. We're not worried about the video for this purpose. But, please, if you send them in, it would be great to have information about the who or what chapter they're in or if it's a blind child, maybe what state and, of course, we won't use fully identifying information if you don't want us to.
But it would be good to know if they were in that BELL Academy or that sort of thing. We would love to have customary ends. [email protected].
PAM ALLEN: Thanks, everybody, for the great questions from our live audience and also the questions submitted. If we didn't have a chance to get to the question this evening, we would definitely follow up with our outstanding communications team. Thank you again so much. It's always fun to hear the questions and to share information. So thank you again so much for everybody who submitted.
Thank you so much for being with us tonight. There will not be a Presidential Release live in July. Join us for our National Convention or virtually, in person, where President Riccobono delivers a Presidential Report and annual banquet speech. You can contact President Riccobono at 410-659-9314 or via email at [email protected]. Thank you. And I will pass it back to you, President Riccobono.
MARK RICCOBONO: Thank you very much, Pam. Great to be with you, and I look forward to being in person with you at the convention.
PAM ALLEN: See you in Orlando!
MARK RICCOBONO: That brings me to the end of this Presidential Release. And I truly am excited about being together with the Federation family at our convention in Orlando. I can already feel the energy and excitement. A lot of work to do in the next month and certainly a lot of Federation activities between now and then, but I'm really looking forward to being in Orlando back at the Rosen Center where we set a world record last time we were there.
So many great memories that I know we will not only remember but create this year. So I'm looking forward to being with all of you. And, please, if you can't be at the convention, make plans, set aside times, rearrange your schedule and get registered for the virtual convention experience so that you can at least get that part of the excitement. This does bring me to the end of our Presidential Release as we go into June when we will kick off summer. I have some of the customary endings.
And the first is...
What do you get when you cross an elephant and a fish?
Why, swimming trunks, of course!
(Laughter)
Now, what is a shark's favorite sandwich?
Peanut butter and jellyfish.
I also want to let you know that our local monastery recently opened a fish and chips outlet. I went in and asked the gentleman there if he was the fish friar. He said, no, I'm the chip monk.
Let's go build the National Federation of the Blind!