Tucked in the back of a women's prison in Gatesville, 40 miles west of Waco, the Billman Braille Center is a hub of activity.
Women in white jumpsuits transcribe textbooks on computers, while others practice their skills on Perkins Braillers — typewriter-like machines that punch dots into the page.
Trichele Allen has been at the braille center for 11 years. She is transcribing the graphics in a college-level anatomy book.
"We make the picture as big as we can for the page and then we do a key page," she said. "Like this would be a texture. This texture here will tell them that those are the ribs."
The center has been here for over 25 years and has ballooned into quite the operation, employing around 90 prisoners who fulfill transcription contracts in Texas and beyond.
Like most prison jobs in Texas, the transcribers aren't paid. But program manager Delores Billman, for whom the center is named, said the goal is to offer mission-driven work behind bars.
"I wanted to give the female population a job and a career that would be meaningful to them also," Billman said.
The center's work creates access to braille that is essential for those who need it.
"For those of us who read braille, braille is literacy," said Robert Englebretson, the chair of the Department of Linguistics at Rice University. "Braille allows us to read in our own voice and at our own pace. Braille allows us to see how sentences are structured and how punctuation works and how things are formatted on the page."
Englebretson has been a braille reader since kindergarten. And despite the rise in other technologies that assist blind and low vision people, he said transcription services are still necessary.
"The automated braille transcription systems often get things very wrong," he said. "If you want textbooks for kids, you want to make sure that the braille is accurate. And so human-based braille transcription is still essential."
Billman started as a correctional officer. She started the program to provide workforce training to female inmates at a time when most programs focused on men's prisons.
"I wanted the ones that were going to be released to have a job that they could do and make money and support themselves," she said.
This remains a primary goal of the center. The U.S. added over 160,000 jobs in August, but many seeking employment report that it feels difficult to find work. People with criminal records are among those hit hardest when the job market is tough — often experiencing an unemployment rate around 30%.
Billman and her original cohort taught themselves braille until they were proficient enough to earn the Library of Congress' transcription certification. She said the hardest part in those early days was finding contracts.
"We could study as long as we wanted to, but it wasn't going to get us anywhere until we actually started production," she said. "And we had to find clients to work for."
The Billman Braille Center is the biggest of the 45 prison braille programs across the U.S., and the only one in Texas.
Prisoners play a big role in producing braille textbooks. Jayma Hawkins is the leader of the National Prison Braille Network at the American Printing House for the Blind.
"In the fiscal year 2025, 70% of all textbooks orders for American Printing House for the Blind were transcribed by prison braille programs in the United States," Hawkins said.
The National Federation of the Blind said incarcerated people make up the majority of those certified in literary braille transcription by the Library of Congress each year.
Christina Harris said knowing she's helping blind people go to school has kept her working in the Billman Braille Center for the last eight years.
"It was a natural fit for me. I truly love my job. I have a background in education. A long time ago I was a teacher. I taught fourth and fifth grade," Harris said. "This is how I'm able to use my degree and still make a difference."
Harris expects to be granted parole soon and she hopes to get a job transcribing braille after she's released.
She'll be in good company. Beverly North was released in 2008 and now directs the braille transcription vendor Visual Aid Volunteers in Garland.
"I had always depended on other people to take care of me," she said. "And I think that's what means the most to me — is I can stand on my own two feet. I take care of myself now."
Professional transcribers get paid per page, so salaries vary, but North said annual pay can range from $45,000 to upwards of six figures. This is part of why the braille center received over 300 applications from women's prisons statewide for just 15 spots this year.
Billman keeps track of the successes.
"The girls out there have formed their own network together," she said. "A lot of the girls that are already out, they will hire the inmates coming out for them to get their start in braille."
North is a leader in that network.
"This program gave me a life. It didn't just change my life, it gave me one," North said. "You don't have to be the same person walking out the gate as you were when you were walking in the gate. And braille can do that for you."
This story was produced with support from the Education Writers Association's Reporting Fellowship program.
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