Yearbooks are one of the most important mementos that one can get from one’s school years.
Even decades later, it always brings a burst of nostalgia to open up one’s yearbooks and see how you and your friends once looked like in your younger years.
But for high school senior RJ Sampson, he never bothered with yearbooks because of one simple fact: he was blind.
However, his classmates did something so amazing for him by making a special braille yearbook for this benefit. It’s aptly called “More Than Meets The Eye” and serves as the theme for the 2019 Conifer High School yearbook.
Not only was the text of the yearbook translated into braille, but his classmates also came up with an app that would play audio recordings as well. All he needs to do is hold a smartphone over a photo to play the recording.
One of the yearbook staff members said, “It just made the book completely accessible for him so he can enjoy it just as much as the rest of the students.”
The idea for a braille yearbook didn’t come out of the blue. Sampson actually requested for such a yearbook from his study hall teacher on the last day of his freshman year. Although his teacher wanted to help, she doubted that the school had enough resources to pull it off.
However, Leslie Thompson and the rest of the yearbook staff did manage to complete this herculean task. And that’s not hyperbole because 1,500 hours of work went into making that special yearbook!
Possibly one of the best parts about it is that Sampson wasn’t expecting the surprise at all. He just assumed his years-old request had been forgotten.
Laurel Ainsworth, yearbook editor-in-chief and one of Sampson’s classmates, presented the special package to him at the “senior send-off” assembly while the whole school was in attendance.
Ainsworth admitted how nervous she was before the presentation. She told 9News, “Yeah, I’m nervous. My stomach doesn’t hurt or anything — it’s all in my head. I just hope that we covered everything so that they can look back in 20 years and we did it justice.”
But she had nothing to worry about as Sampson was all smiles when they announced the special yearbook.
An emotional Sampson said, “It’s absolutely amazing and I can’t wait to actually read it.
“It really means a lot to me. The community here is really so loving.”
The special gesture was also an important lesson for students not only in making life easier for the disabled but also realizing how much normal people take for granted.
However, Sampson was well aware of what went into making the yearbook. Because of the size difference between braille and printed English, they had to put a lot of effort into making a unique design that worked.
It’s no surprise that the yearbook committee was overjoyed with the fact that they managed to complete their special project without a hitch and more importantly, that their hard work was appreciated.
Sampson plans to take up computer science at the University of Colorado in Boulder but now he can figuratively look back on his years in high school with fondness thanks to his generous classmates.