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The Hatlen Center, A Program of Junior Blind

General Information

The Hatlen Center, A Program of Junior Blind
2430 Road 20 # B112
San Pablo, CA 94806
510-234-4984
https://www.wayfinderfamily.org/program/the-hatlen-center

Brief Description

The Hatlen Center is the first transition program and was founded in 1972 by Dr. Philip Hatlen, retired Supt. of Texas School for the Blind and Visually Impaired.
The Hatlen Center is a residential program that teaches people who are blind or visually impaired to live independently by actually living independently. Since 1972, the Center's learn-by-doing apartment setting has helped to empower generations of visually impaired people to take charge of their own lives.
The Hatlen Center is located in a 76-unit apartment complex in the San Francisco Bay Area. The Center rents office/classroom space from the management, and the students live in eight, two-bedroom apartments. Each student has his/her own bedroom, and shares the dining room, kitchen, living room, and bathroom with a roommate.

Services Offered

  • Counseling
    • Provides assertiveness training and referrals to community services. Refers for other counseling/social work services.

  • Employment/Job Training
    • Provides prevocational evaluation and training, career/skill counseling, follow-up service. Places students in part-time volunteer and/or paid positions.

  • Recreation Services
    • Offers camping, skiing, sea kayaking, shopping, hiking, regular informal exercise program, jogging, swimming, and yoga.

  • Computer Training/Assistive Technology
    • Offers training in the use of other adaptive technology.

  • Information and Referral
    • Provides extensive information and referral services via telephone.

  • Travel/Orientation and Mobility
    • Provides orientation and mobility training.

  • Health
    • Refers for medical services, assists in obtaining low vision evaluations and services, fosters medical awareness through evaluations.

  • Braille and Reading Instruction
    • Offers braille instruction to its students.

  • Daily Living Skills/Independent Living Skills Training
    • Performs broad evaluations and provides training in the following skills in client's apartment and in the community: cooking, cleaning, care of clothing, financial management and bill-paying, orientation and mobility, adaptive technology, transition to college, housing, pre-vocational skills.