Matthew VanFossan

No one would have accused Matt VanFossan of taking the easy way out if he had decided to quit college when a corneal ulcer left the visually impaired junior completely blind.

"I honestly thought there was no question that he would stay at home. I thought it would just be too hard," said his mother, Margaret VanFossan.

And it was hard. But not so hard that VanFossan, 23, was willing to quit. "It was tough. ... But I didn't want to give up college," he said.

VanFossan, of Ross, who graduated from Oberlin College in Ohio in May with a degree in Latin American studies and politics, is one of six students who will be recognized tomorrow at the Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic National Achievement Awards gala in Princeton, N.J.

He is the recipient of the National Achievement Award program's $6,000 Mary P. Oenslager Scholastic Achievement Award, given annually to college seniors with visual impairments who have demonstrated exceptional scholarship, leadership, enterprise and service to others.

Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic is a nonprofit organization serving 135,000 students with a library of 100,000 recorded textbooks and other educational materials.

VanFossan was born with glaucoma. He could not see well enough to drive or read, but until his junior year of college, he had enough vision in one eye to get around without a cane or guide dog. Then he developed a corneal ulcer in his seeing eye. It became infected, leaving him totally blind. He recuperated at home for a few weeks but decided to return to school.

The adjustment wasn't easy. He had to rely on friends to take him to frequent doctors' appointments. He had to learn the tricky art of using a cane on campus.

"Then it would snow and the terrain would be completely un-recognizable. I got lost tons of times," he said.

Family, friends and professors were a huge support. He eventually got a guide dog, a yellow lab named Guildenstern.

"I don't think he missed a class or turned in a paper late that whole time," said Steven Volk, an Oberlin history professor.

VanFossan found time to volunteer, tutoring a blind middle school pupil in Braille and serving on the board of the National Alliance of Blind Students. He and other alliance members started a successful letter-writing campaign to persuade the Educational Testing Service to stop placing asterisks by the names of students with disabilities in testing reports to colleges.

"I've learned to be a very good advocate for myself," said VanFossan.

He is living with his family in Ross while recovering from corneal transplant surgery. He won't know the results for three months; at best, his vision will be at the level he had before the ulcer. In the meantime, he is making preparations to use a Rotary scholarship for a year of study in Brazil. Beyond that, he's undecided: perhaps law school or other doctoral studies.

"His blindness is just a part of him," his mother said. "It's shaped who he is, but there is so much more to him than that."