It can be tough being a teenager at the best of times, but life is even more challenging when you cannot see properly!

Seventeen-year-old Lydia Kombortaa lives in Ghana, and had been complaining of poor eyesight since was a little girl. She couldn’t see the chalkboard at school and had resorted to copying lecture notes from her friends’ notebooks instead. Having to rely on others to get by was frustrating, not to mention embarrassing. But what choice did Lydia have?

Then, one day an optometrist from Ejura Government Hospital, one of Operation Eyesight’s partner hospitals in Ghana, conducted a vision screening at Lydia’s school. The optometrist discovered that Lydia had low vision and referred her to the hospital, where an eye examination revealed that Lydia had a very high myopia. Simply put, she required prescription eyeglasses to correct her near-sighted vision.

Lydia’s mother was worried. She was a widowed peasant farmer working hard to provide for her six children. How would she ever find the money to pay for a pair of eyeglasses?

But her worries soon faded away when she learned that Lydia would receive a brand new pair of eyeglasses free of charge, thanks to Operation Eyesight’s donors.

With her new eyeglasses, Lydia’s vision has improved immensely, and she can copy her own notes right from the chalkboard. Lydia and her mother are grateful to Operation Eyesight and its partner for this life-changing gift.

“I’m so happy that I can do things by myself without any assistance from my friends in school,” says Lydia. “Thank you!”

You can give the gift of sight and independence to more people like Lydia. A $20 gift can provide prescription eyeglasses for up to three people living in Africa or India. Please consider making a donation today.

The post Improved vision increases a teen’s independence appeared first on Operation Eyesight.

You may remember that last year, we raised enough money on GivingTuesday to set five villages in India free of avoidable blindness. This year, our goal is to raise $10,000 for our school eye screening programs in Kenya’s Narok District.

With these funds, we can screen over 7,000 students and ensure that those found with low vision receive the prescription eyeglasses or other treatment they need. With your support, we can help more students like Paul and Mercy, providing them with the most important tool they need to succeed: good eyesight.

There are many ways that you can help us reach our fundraising goal this GivingTuesday. You can make a donation, plan your own fundraising event or help us spread the word about the issue of avoidable blindness. And if you live in Calgary, you can also register a team for our Strikes for Sight bowling tournament.

For more information visit operationeyesightindia.org/givingtuesday or contact our office toll-free at 1-800-585-8265.

Again, we’d like to thank everyone who made last year’s GivingTuesday project a huge success. We hope we can count on our friends and supporters again this year.

We know that, together, we can do great things – for all the world to see!

The post Get ready for GivingTuesday 2015! appeared first on Operation Eyesight.