Greetings, and thank you for visiting!
I’m Jason Broughton, director of National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) in Washington, DC, part of the Library of Congress. I’d like to take a moment to give you a brief introduction to our program and the services we provide.
Since its establishment in 1931, NLS has had one mission: to ensure that a disability is no barrier to one’s opportunity to experience the joy of reading.
Today, we provide reading materials to people with visual impairments, and physical and reading disabilities, working in partnership with our network of more than 90 cooperating libraries, serving people in every state and US territory. We also serve US citizens living abroad.
Our collection has hundreds of thousands of books, magazines, and music instruction and appreciation materials in braille and digital audio—nearly half of them available instantly from BARD, our online Braille and Audio Reading Download service. The NLS program has evolved from vinyl records and cassettes to digital audio cartridges and downloadable files available on demand via our BARD app.
All of this has been from the very start provided free of charge to our patrons. Always imagining what the future can bring, we continue to explore ways to leverage the latest technology to improve our service to patrons and expand our collections.
The staff members at NLS, in partnership with hundreds more at our network libraries around the country, are inspired by a simple phrase that perfectly sums up our mission: That All May Read.
And if you have questions, you can Ask a Librarian or email [email protected]. Or want more information about service, just click on the “Find Your Library” link at the top of every web page or call 888-NLS-READ (888-657-7323) to get in touch with the NLS network library in your community or state.
I invite you to explore this website to learn more about who we are and how we can serve you, a family member or friend, or one of your students or patients.
— Director Jason Broughton