This is not a sitting exam. It is a 20-lesson correspondence or local-class course in literary braille transcribing, run by the National Federation of the Blind under contract with the National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled, Library of Congress. You submit graded lesson exercises, then a trial manuscript of 35 braille pages of material you choose; a score of 80 points or above earns the Library of Congress certificate in literary braille transcribing. Most students finish in nine to twelve months, and there is no tuition.
What this certification is
The NFB teaches literary braille transcribing under contract with NLS, and successful completion earns a Library of Congress certificate.
Under a contract with the National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS), Library of Congress, the National Federation of the Blind (NFB) runs a course in literary braille transcribing. It teaches you to convert print materials into braille. NLS confirms that the Librarian of Congress and the NLS director continue to authorize and issue the resulting certifications.
The course is explicitly not a way to learn braille as your own reading and writing skill. It is a transcription qualification: the certificate qualifies you to transcribe general literary materials and serves as a prerequisite for other transcribing and proofreading courses.
Everything in the course is based on Unified English Braille (UEB), the code the International Council on English Braille developed to unify literary, mathematics and computing symbols across English-speaking countries.
Official sources: Literary Braille Transcribing | National Federation of the Blind — Program page: contract with NLS, eligibility, equipment, course mechanics, certification test, enrollment, instructional manuals; Braille Education - National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) | Library of Congress — NLS contract award to NFB and certification authority; Unified English Braille (UEB) - International Council on English Braille (ICEB) — UEB purpose, adoption, rulebook editions
Eligibility, equipment and cost
You need US citizenship or residency, a high school diploma or equivalent, and braille-writing equipment that does not rely on translation software.
The stated eligibility requirements are United States citizenship or residency and a high school diploma or equivalent. There is no tuition charge, and the instructional materials can be downloaded free from the NFB or requested in hard copy. If you withdraw, you must return any hard copy materials.
You cannot use braille translation software at any point in the course. Direct typing or brailling is the required method, because the course is testing your own command of the code rather than a program's output.
- United States citizenship or residency
- High school diploma or equivalent
- A manual braillewriter, or a computer with a six-key direct input software program; translation software may not be used
- A forty-cell slate is also permissible
- Braille paper (11 by 11.5 inches) if you submit exercises by mail rather than email
How the course and certification test work
The UEB edition course runs through 20 lessons with graded exercises, and the final trial manuscript is 35 braille pages scored by the NFB; 80 points or above earns the certificate.
The Instruction Manual for Braille Transcribing, UEB Edition, contains 20 graded lessons covering the braille alphabet, contractions and the rules for writing braille. Each lesson ends with an exercise of sentences or short passages that test comprehension and review earlier material. Local class instructors grade the exercises, or the NFB grades them if you study by correspondence.
Your instructor sends written reports pointing out errors and citing the manual sections you should restudy. If an exercise has too many errors, you are asked to resubmit it, and you get three chances to submit an acceptable version of each exercise.
The final exercise is the certification test: a transcription of 35 braille pages of material you choose, usually part of a book. You submit the manuscript with the print text to the NFB for scoring. Candidates scoring 80 points or above receive the Library of Congress certificate in literary braille transcribing.
The course takes approximately nine to twelve months to complete, including the trial manuscript. The trial manuscript must be submitted in hard-copy braille; thermoform copies are not accepted, though computer preparation with six-key direct entry is allowed as long as you separate and collate the pages.
- Submit only one lesson at a time, and submit exercises regularly, at least monthly
- If the NFB does not hear from you for three months, your name is removed from the program's active file
- Three chances apply to lesson exercises and, separately, to the trial manuscript
- Every submitted exercise is evaluated, and resubmission is required when errors are excessive
Braille cells, digits and capitalization
The six-dot cell is the foundation: letters build from it in a fixed pattern, digits reuse letter cells behind a numeric indicator, and capitals use one, two or three dot-6 indicators depending on span.
The braille cell is an arrangement of six dots, and sixty-three different patterns are possible. Dots are numbered 1-2-3 down the left column and 4-5-6 down the right. The first ten letters, a through j, use only the upper two rows; k through t add dot 3 to each of those; u through z add dots 3 and 6 to the first five letters, with w as an exception because the French alphabet had no w when Louis Braille created the code.
Digits reuse those same letter cells. The ICEB rulebook examples write 14 as the numeric indicator followed by the cells for a and d, and 1998 as the indicator followed by the cells for a, i, i and h. The numeric indicator (dots 3456) is what tells the reader the following cells are digits, not letters.
Capitalization works in spans: a single capital sign (dot 6) precedes one capital letter, an all-capital word takes the two-cell capital word indicator, as the rulebook shows for IBM, and a fully capitalized passage uses a three-cell indicator with a terminator, as in the rulebook's all-caps warning example. The course covers the choice and placement of these indicators, including grade 1 (uncontracted) indicators, across its lessons.
Worked practice
A print chapter heading reads: ACME FOUNDED 1847. Assume a contracted (grade 2) UEB transcription, and assume the digits 1, 8, 4 and 7 reuse the braille cells for the letters a, h, d and g respectively. (a) Write the braille for 1847. (b) Which capitalization indicator does the word ACME need, and why?
Show the worked answer
(a) ⠼⠁⠓⠙⠛ — the numeric indicator (dots 3456) followed by the cells for a, h, d and g. (b) The capital word indicator: two consecutive dot-6 cells placed before the word, giving ⠠⠠⠁⠉⠍⠑.
The rulebook's own examples show 14 written with the numeric indicator before the a and d cells, and 1998 written as the indicator followed by the cells for a, i, i and h, which is why 1847 reads as a-h-d-g behind ⠼. Without the numeric indicator, a reader would see letters. For capitals, the rulebook writes IBM with two dot-6 cells before its letters, the pattern for an all-capital word, while a lone capital such as the A in 'A boy and his dog' takes a single dot-6 capital sign. ACME is entirely capitalized, so it follows the IBM pattern.
Official sources: About Braille - National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) | Library of Congress — Braille cell structure, alphabet construction, transcriber and proofreader roles; The Rules of Unified English Braille, Third Edition, 2024 (ICEB) — Alphabet and capitalization examples, numeric indicator usage, transcriber's note indicators, typeforms, contractions summary; Unified English Braille (UEB) - International Council on English Braille (ICEB) — UEB purpose, adoption, rulebook editions
Contractions, typeform and transcription layout
Later lessons cover contractions and shortforms, typeform indicators for emphasis, transcriber's notes, and the proofreading discipline that all braille production requires.
Braille uses contractions and short-form words to save space and make tactile reading efficient. The rulebook summarizes contractions early on and maintains a Shortforms List in its appendix, with rules governing when a contracted sign may stand for a word or word part. The course lessons introduce these signs progressively with drills, and the specific usage limits for each wordsign and shortform are exactly what the graded exercises test, so work from the lesson manuals rather than from memory.
UEB handles emphasis with typeform indicators, covered in the rulebook's typeforms section, rather than by switching to a separate code. The rulebook also shows transcribers deciding when to reproduce print typeform and when a transcriber's note explaining the typeface serves the reader better.
Transcriber's note indicators enclose words of explanation that you, the transcriber, add to the text, but they are not used for general notes listed on a separate preliminary page. This distinction between your words and the print author's words is central to faithful transcription.
Expect proofreading to be a constant throughout the course and beyond it: NLS notes that computer-assisted braille translation is imperfect and that materials must always be checked by a qualified braille proofreader, which is why a separate proofreading credential exists.
Official sources: The Rules of Unified English Braille, Third Edition, 2024 (ICEB) — Alphabet and capitalization examples, numeric indicator usage, transcriber's note indicators, typeforms, contractions summary; About Braille - National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) | Library of Congress — Braille cell structure, alphabet construction, transcriber and proofreader roles; Literary Braille Transcribing | National Federation of the Blind — Program page: contract with NLS, eligibility, equipment, course mechanics, certification test, enrollment, instructional manuals
Submission rules that protect your standing
A few administrative rules decide whether you finish: steady monthly submissions, one lesson at a time, hard-copy braille for the manuscript, and approved equipment only.
These administrative rules come directly from the NFB's program page, and knowing them before you enroll helps you plan a realistic submission schedule.
- Use a manual braillewriter or six-key direct input only; translation software is never permitted
- Submit the trial manuscript as hard-copy braille; thermoform copies are not acceptable
- Submit one lesson at a time and keep to a regular schedule of at least monthly submissions
- Expect resubmission requests when an exercise has too many errors, and restudy the cited manual sections before resubmitting
- Return borrowed hard-copy materials if you withdraw from the course
Related credentials and career routes
The literary certificate is the entry point; after six months of experience you can add mathematics, music or proofreading certification, and volunteer work often leads to paid braille production roles.
The Library of Congress literary certificate is a prerequisite for other NFB-run courses. After six months of experience as a literary braille transcriber, you may enroll in mathematics braille transcribing, music braille transcribing, or proofreading. A background in math is helpful for the mathematics course, and in-depth knowledge of print music is a prerequisite for the music course. New transcribers are also encouraged to gain experience with textbook and technical braille formats by working with local transcribing groups.
On the career side, NLS describes how many transcribers and proofreaders work, often as volunteers, producing materials that supplement books from NLS and its network of cooperating libraries. Many people volunteer specifically to gain the experience needed to be hired by braille production agencies and school systems. The National Braille Association, a professional organization for transcribers, offers guidance and professional development.
No earnings figures are available from the program sources, so treat this as a skills-first path: certification builds a portfolio of acceptable manuscripts, and volunteering is the documented route into paid work.
Official sources: Literary Braille Transcribing | National Federation of the Blind — Program page: contract with NLS, eligibility, equipment, course mechanics, certification test, enrollment, instructional manuals; About Braille - National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) | Library of Congress — Braille cell structure, alphabet construction, transcriber and proofreader roles
Official sources
Key facts checked 17 September 2026:
- Literary Braille Transcribing | National Federation of the Blind
- Braille Education - National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) | Library of Congress
- About Braille - National Library Service for the Blind and Print Disabled (NLS) | Library of Congress
- Unified English Braille (UEB) - International Council on English Braille (ICEB)
- The Rules of Unified English Braille, Third Edition, 2024 (ICEB)