"Our program is usually the first schooling experience for some of these students, and seeing how it changes their lives for the better is a very rewarding experience for all of us."
You'd be hard-pressed to find a quieter classroom in Wilson Hall, but don't be fooled. There's plenty of interacting and learning going on. The 12 students range in age from 21 to 62. They include a stockroom worker, a house painter, a jewelry maker, a hospital volunteer, a housewife and a cook. One is a recent immigrant from Lithuania; another, a young woman from the Philippines hoping to attend college in the United States.
They are here at Brown on this warm evening for a class offered by the Deaf Literacy Program, funded by the Rhode Island Department of Education and the Swearer Center for Public Service. The free classes, held two nights a week for two hours each, aim to improve students' English and American Sign Language skills.
The Deaf Literacy Program began in 1991 when the local deaf community became aware that some deaf adults needed basic reading and writing skills. Developed by a coalition, the program is the only one of its kind in the state and serves the deaf population well beyond Providence. About 24 adults currently are enrolled in two classes. One offers instruction in very basic English and signing skills; the other more advanced course is geared to those trying to get their General Equivalency Diploma and possibly go on to college. Students in the classes produce an annual newsletter called The Deaf Connection.
Both classes are team-taught by deaf professionals in the education field. The founders of the program felt that the team approach would offer a higher proportion of teachers to students in the classroom; that more than one style of teaching would serve broader needs; and that it would be an advantage to have people with different strengths. According to Marie T. Cora, assistant director of the Swearer Center, the model works so well that it has been incorporated into other programs offered by the center.
The program's only requirements are that students be deaf or severely hard of hearing, and willing to learn and use sign skills. Most have had some formal schooling, and many have graduated from the School for the Deaf. Each student has an IEP - Individualized Education Plan - with a particular set of goals. The student remains in the program until those goals have been met or it's time to move to another setting.
Earnest Okwara of the Swearer Center has been the program's coordinator for five years and was a founding member when it began in 1991. "We have a number of students from countries where there are no schools for the deaf and where the native language is not English," he wrote during a recent interview. "Our program is usually the first schooling experience for some of these students, and seeing how it changes their lives for the better is a very rewarding experience for all of us." Seeing the students develop positive relationships with their friends and becoming productive members of society is another rewarding aspect of the program, he added.
Okwara shared that many of the students have found better paying jobs, become better prepared to attend college, or opened private businesses instructing sign language as a result of attending the program. He noted that although the goal of the program is to help students improve their reading and writing skills, it also helps students in the area of self-advocacy and learning about their rights. "Last week," he noted, "the students went to the State House for four hours to see how the legislative process works."
Tracey Z. Poole is a Rhode Island-based freelance writer. She is a member of t he Class of 1985.