In a speech to Australian and New Zealand teachers of the visually handicapped the author stresses the importance of educating deaf blind persons regardless of the severity of their handicaps, illustrating his point with three case histories. The deaf blind are viewed under the following five headings: the highly educable (who have college potential), the superior (those capable of financial independence), the average (approximately 80 percent of the whole who are capable of learning a saleable skill but need public or family aid), the unemployable, and the untrainable. Focused on is the value of education in the lives of three deaf blind persons: a Chinese girl, a little girl in a school for the blind in Bangkok, Thailand, and a boy whose achievements led to legislation mandating federal support for the deaf blind. (LS)