When a Tennessee mother of five received her college degree on May 9, she couldn’t see her family cheering in the audience – because she is completely blind.
Even so, as Amanda Juetten, 47, crossed the stage to accept her degree – magna cum laude – from Tennessee Tech University, she was more certain than ever about her path forward.
“I’m totally blind,” Juetten told Fox News Digital in an interview. “So I’ve got my guide dog by my side.”
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“The two guys I was sitting by told me to follow them — we were a team. I’m concentrating on shaking all the hands and getting across the stage. I was thinking, ‘This isn’t the end. It’s really the beginning of what’s next.’”
Juetten, who recently became a grandmother, began her college journey nearly 30 years ago, but had to postpone her studies when she had a baby right out of high school — and immediately went to work to provide for her new family.
She eventually returned to higher education, but in 2020, after years of progressive vision loss from a condition called retinitis pigmentosa, she found herself in the dark — literally.
“I was left totally blind with no skills for blindness,” Juetten said. “Over the years, I had been taught a lot of skills for using my remaining vision, but not what to do with no vision at all.’”
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Determined to regain her independence, she enrolled in an eight-month program at the Colorado Center for the Blind.
“I thought, ‘I know blind parents make their kids’ lunches. I know blind parents go to PTA meetings. I can do this. I just need to be around a bunch of other blind people,’” she recalled.
“I want to help give people the skills to find their voice.”
“Blind people are not sitting in their basements waiting for the end. They’re out there living their lives, and I wanted to do that, too.”
With her new skills and adaptive techniques — and a renewed sense of confidence — Juetten enrolled at Tennessee Tech in the fall of 2022, pursuing a professional studies degree with a concentration in organizational leadership.
“It’s been great,” Juetten said. “The instructors were asking, ‘What are your needs? How can I make this accessible to you?’ They have been fantastic for doing that. I never got pushback. I didn’t get people saying, ‘Why are you taking these classes?’”
Now, the newly graduated Juetten is advocating for more acceptance and understanding of the blind.
“The blind need a voice,” Juetten said. “I have a voice and I love to use it. I want to help give people the skills to find their voice. We need more teachers and more people in the field who believe in the full capacity of the blind.”
Next, she plans to pursue a graduate degree in blindness rehabilitation and possibly even a doctorate.
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“I want to begin offering services in assistive technology, Braille and the things I’ve learned and am doing well,” Juetten said. “I want to teach blind people as a vendor of vocational rehabilitation.”
Juetten has traveled to Washington, D.C., to lobby for blindness-related initiatives and to San Francisco to protest rideshare drivers who deny service to passengers with wheelchairs or service animals.
She also serves on the board of the National Federation of the Blind of Tennessee and is a past president of the Tennessee Association of Guide Dog Users.
Her guide dog, Colonel, is always by her side.
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Juetten has the below message for anyone facing blindness.
“You still have the same hopes and dreams,” she said. “All of those things that you wanted to do before you were blind, you still want to do those things. So let’s find a way to do that.”
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