Tuesday, October 18, 2011

New Show on Gallaudet students, and, Part I of Deaf as Disability Series

I just discovered that MTV will be airing a new show focused on the lives of college kids at Gallaudet University, which, as you may or may not know, is the only college for the deaf and hard of hearing.  It's called "Quiet Campus" and will be aired on mtvU, which apparently is a MTV channel focused on college students (which confuses me - isn't regular MTV focused on college students?)  Anyway, here's the press release, and here's a blog post in the NY Times with some quotes from some of the students featured in Quiet Campus.

I think this will be cool to watch.  The premise of the show is apparently that deaf kids aren't that different from "typical" kids - they're wrestling with the same issues, have many of the same concerns.  I think it will attract viewers who want insight into a world that they're likely unfamiliar with.  And if Switched at Birth is any indication, the series could attract quite a number of viewers.

HOWEVER, my next set of thoughts about this show (Quiet Campus) is that inescapably, this is going to highlight differences between deaf kids and hearing kids.  Inevitably!  Deaf kids use ASL, and have alternate ways of using technology.  Alarms clocks in Gallaudet, I'll just bet, involve flashing lights and vibrations - not songs or musical sounds from your iPhone.  Being deaf is different, in the sense that being any kind of minority is different from the way the majority of people deal with the world.

This gets to something that I see as a big tension in the deaf/Deaf community.  One set of people who have no hearing ("Deaf") view being Deaf as being part of a separate cultural community, one with its own language (ASL), history, and current culture.  Another set of people who have no hearing ("deaf") do not wish to participate in a Deaf community - they learn to speak and read lips, they rely on cochlear implants, and they attempt to integrate into mainstream US culture as much as possible.  So, I suppose it's like any minority community - there are those who emphasize the differences from the majority culture, and are those who integrate.

And yet for the Deaf, there is another issue that doesn't face other minorities - there is something more to the difference between Deaf and hearing.  There is in fact, some kind of dis-ability; Deaf people cannot use the communication modality - hearing and speaking - that the majority uses.  And this is why we as a society have chosen to support the Deaf by (a) recognizing that Deaf people need technical accommodations, like TTY systems, and better access to the 911 system and (b) providing educational services, in the form of IDEA supports and publicly funded schools for the Deaf.

But a lot of Deaf people seem really uncomfortable with the idea that they are "disabled".  Their view is "hey, there's nothing wrong with me, I can do anything that typical people can, I don't need to be fixed".  I certainly sympathize with this view - I have trouble labeling my own daughter as "disabled".  However, in order for my daughter to receive special ed services, she must fall within one of the legally defined categories of disability - that's just how we as a society have organized these programs.  So, too, with deafness - it's one of the categories defined under the ADA, the IDEA, and all the other laws as a disability.

So, what do you think?  Is being Deaf a disability?  Is it not?  Is the issue actually one where we need to throw out the disability/ability categories entirely?  What should replace it?

I plan to keep talking about these issues, so check back soon!

Friday, October 7, 2011

Online School Management Systems, or, will you ever talk to your kid's teacher in person again?

As you know, I'm quite interested in the intersection between technology and education: what are the positives?  what are the negatives?  I recently read an article that highlights how the same technology can be both good and bad.

In the WSJ last week (sorry, I am perpetually behind the times), there was an article about how schools are increasingly using online tools to communicate with parents and students - grades, class info, contact information, and upcoming events are increasingly being communicated via online platforms accessible to parents and students.  Picture a facebook page for your kid's classroom - events, other participants, and specific information about how your kid is doing.  You can check out the article here

So, the upside, in this increasingly digital world, you can use these systems to (a) communicate with your kid's teacher more regularly - no more waiting for a parent-teacher conference to address a concern, (b) monitor your kid's homework/grades, so that you can intervene if something's going off track, and (c) be able to communicate with other parents.  I certainly know how hard it is to keep in touch with your kid's teachers, and more ways to do it seems better than the alternative.  Working parents may rarely actually see their kid's teachers, and being able to stay in the loop via emails is nice. 

But...on the other hand, is this just another piece of technology that's going to get lost in the noise of all the emails/facebooks/other sites we deal with on a daily basis?  One mom in the article basically abstained from the online school platform, saying it was just one thing too many to deal with.  (I understand that too!  I have, at last count, 7 email accounts).  And despite our texting/virtual world, there is still something to in-person conversations, and building actual personal connections with the people that your child spends the most time with.

And, just to throw another iron into the fire, are these online school systems accessible to people with disabilities?  Recall earlier conversations on this point, on accessibility of digital educational materials and accessibility of communication systems.  If a student is blind, or has vision difficulties, are these online school systems accessible to screen readers?  And what about the parents?  What if a parent is deaf, blind, or has another disability where using online systems requires alternative technologies (like screen readers, or switch systems).  Hmmmm?

I don't have an answer, and I'd be happy to hear what your experiences are with these portals.  Honestly, these systems aren't going away - but we do need to make sure that they are appropriate to all students and their families.