There will be a Lunch & Learn entitled “Helping the World See Clearly” at St. Michaels Library on May 6, noon.
In the fall of 2004, J. Kevin White, Founder and Executive Director of Global Vision 2020 (GV2020), then an active duty US Marine, participated in his first Humanitarian and Civic Assistance outreach in Morocco. The unit was distributing used eyeglasses and he noticed the inefficiencies of the process – mismatched prescriptions, frame sizes that did not fit – and knew there was a better approach. He researched options and began using self-refraction liquid silicon eyeglasses for US military outreaches. Although an improvement in determining prescriptions, the eyeglasses were susceptible to damage by heat, and their large size made them less than desirable.
His passion to develop a solution and give prescription eyeglasses to the 2.5 billion people living in low resource regions, led him to combine the ideas of self-refraction (a patient determining their own prescription), and conventional eyeglasses, to develop the USee. The device allows a patient to dial through a progressive lens bar until they see clearly. Upon determining the correct power for their sight, a ready-to-wear pair of eyeglasses is snapped together on the spot.
In January 2018, Kevin won the WeWork Creator Award $1 Million Grand Prize and has built a small team headquartered in Easton, MD. The team is currently building programmatic partnerships in several nations in Sub-Saharan Africa, and South America. The unique approach of the USee, and its compact size, allows GV2020 to challenge the conventional methods of delivering prescription eyeglasses to the most remote areas of the world. The Lunch and Learn series is sponsored by the Friends of the Library, coffee and dessert will be provided. For more information you can call 410 745-5877 or check the website at www.tcfl.org.
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