Being visually impaired doesn’t mean you can’t live a fulfilling life. That’s a message William Bowman, the president of Visually Impaired People, Inc. (V.I.P) spreads every time he discusses his organization.

On Friday, he honored Melvin Pylant as his Visually Impaired Person of the Year Award. Pylant said he never lets being visually impaired control his life. He’s always found a way to do what he wants to do.

“I made up my mind when I was going to gentry school that I was not going to sit down and just live in self-pity,” Pylant said. “I was going to do what I could do.”

That kind of devotion is what made Pylant the right choice to be the VIP person of the year. He was given the honor during VIP’s year-end banquet, which capped off a busy year for the organization.

Just in the last few months, Bowman has spoken at the School of Discovery’s about bullying and gave out free information to Wallace Community College Selma’s health fair.

It’s clear that VIP has helped a lot of people in the Selma community since its founding. VIP has a support group, a mentoring program and numerous educational programs that help those in the community and Bowman continues to push forward to find new ways to help.

During this Christmas season, many like to give a donation to organizations in their local community. There are so many deserving nonprofits to consider donating to, and VIP deserves a look too.