Deaf son

Mom - listen to your son. Despite your reservations about the education in the deaf school, keep in mind that letting him go to one pays off in the long run. He'd grow up to be a more well-adjusted and happier man and that's crucial to his ability to contend living in the hearing world as a deaf guy.

Well Joey, you got on my nerves sometimes but I got your back on this one as one mainstreamer to another.
 
My mom never log in for long time lol. But maybe I can ask her to log in sometimes.

-That's true haha, I get on everyone nerves sometimes too. I'm still young and I have a lot to learn :). Also thanks for have my back.
 
I see my original post from 2008. Boy, has my opinion really changed since. I've learned a lot on this forum, and read the horrors of mainstreaming and realized I could've written the same stories! I now really wish I had the experience of a deaf school.
 
Lucky, recent I had a talk with my parents and I finally can attend FSDB!
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To anyone lurking.....Another option if the Deaf School in your state isn't great, is that you could send your teen/older kid to live with grandparents/relatives in another state.
I think that the option of Deaf School should be an option for ALL dhh kids. Like it should be made clear that ALL dhh kids have the option to attend. I honestly think a lot of hearing parents would move closer to the Deaf School. But parents aren't told about the Deaf School as a placement option. Again, it's been over 30 years since going to Deaf School was the norm. And a lot of parents believe the myth that mainstreaming is better for dhh kids. I think that public schools push that myth, so that they can use the kids as cash cows. Public schools can legally give minimal accomondations (meaning as skimpy as possible) and still be said to be within the law.
 
and I'm only deaf student goes there. I dislike how lonely I am, so I told my parents that I want to attend SCSDB few years ago after we moved to SC from Va and they turned down because they think I won't able to go to college if I finish deaf school. Therefore, that caused me to think many deaf schools Education is bad and I caused a flame here at Alldeaf. I'm glad I am not that bitter enough to be open mind about deaf schools and I finally told my parents that even if they want me to go there or not, I will go there. We had that talk few weeks ago and they let me attend FSDB this year
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I'm glad to see that you changed your opinon. There are some really decent Deaf Schools out there...and I honestly think that if parents of solotaires or even kids in dhh programs at public schools saw what it's like at Deaf Schools, the number of even hoh kids in the mainstream would be VERY low. Heck, I bet a lot of the parents of kids in oral programs would be super surprised at what goes on at Deaf School......We have a couple of parents of solotaire kids, who enrolled them into either Deaf School or formal program, and they can't say enough good things about them! That says a lot....I mean it is a FACT that most mainstream schools will not have a lot of experianced TODs.
 
Boy, has my opinion really changed since. I've learned a lot on this forum, and read the horrors of mainstreaming and realized I could've written the same stories! I now really wish I had the experience of a deaf school.
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Alley, how old are you? I have noticed some older deaf adults bashing Deaf Schools, b/c they think it"s like they were when they were kids. Back in the old days, expectations at Deaf Schools were really low.
So education suffered. So the mainstream seemed to be better educationally. But, then the law changed so that mainstream schools had to accept dhh kids. We brought lots of money, but they could get away with providing minimal accomondations, as well as crappy 'terps and crappy TODs that we only saw for a few mintues a day. Not to mention that a lot of us were lumped in with the " Ummm who's President So and So?' dumbasses in the Resource Room. The simple fact of the matter is that mainstream sped is not AT ALL equipted to give kids with low incidence disabilties a really good education. So we got lumped in with clueless teachers, instead of attending a School or a program for the Deaf, where the teachers had been trained to teach dhh kids!
 
shel90 said:
That's a common myth about the Deaf schools because people are looking at the numbers. I work at a Deaf school and my old beliefs about Deaf schools not pushing the kids, dumb down the curriculm and so forth changed. I grew up mainstreamed and always thought those who went to the Deaf schools were lower than average intelligence ..boy was I wrong. I and the other teachers push our students hard. We use the public school curriculm.

Maybe it depends on each school and their philosophy but not all Deaf schools provide less quality education.

If one looks at the statistics and base their opinions on the statistics alone, they are missing the big picture. More than half of the students who graduate from the Deaf schools enter them at a later age after falling so far behind in other programs. In my 5 years as a teacher, I see that as a common but disturbing trend.

I wish I had gone to the Deaf school and I remember I did express wanting to go when I was in middle school only to be told that I was too smart for it. Looking back, those educators were sorely wrong and as a result, my self-esteem almost got completely destroyed cuz I missed out on so much on everything being mainstreamed all day.

My brother attended and graduated from the Deaf school in my hometown and now he is pursuing his Master's at a highly ranked college on the Eastern shore. He is halfway completed so if the Deaf school where he attended failed him, he wouldnt be where he is now. I am glad he wasnt mainstreamed cuz for sure the mainstreamed program would have failed him cuz the attitude from my mainstreamed program was that Deaf people who lack oral skills are "dumb" and my brother was unable to develop oral skills. For sure, he would have been placed in a class with other children with MR , LD or ED. I had good oral skills so therefore I was "smart" according to the specialists at my school which was pretty bullcrap to begin with.
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Boom. /thread.

Deaf schools has academic statistics that is all over the place since to their students maybe going to mainstreamed school for couple years only to found it's not suited best for them and then go to Deaf school at a later age to play catch-up, socially and academically. There's other reasons, but find the one that is best for your son's needs, not drop him off and have Deaf/Mainstream school do the rest for him.

"What does your school has to offer?"
 
Let him go to the deaf school. I was in his shoes and I actually dropped out of high school with a 4.0 GPA because I couldn't stand being in the mainstreamed setting (and it wasn't very mainstreamed despite the word "mainstreamed") - academics isn't everything. A few months later my parents finally allowed me to go to the deaf school...the deaf school allowed me to go to a nearby college to take a couple of classes per week while learning social skills and just being myself. I'm now a teacher at a deaf school, thus I've come to a full circle since being a deaf kid in a not-so-deaf world. Let him go, and he will grow.
 
shel90 said:
That's a common myth about the Deaf schools because people are looking at the numbers. I work at a Deaf school and my old beliefs about Deaf schools not pushing the kids, dumb down the curriculm and so forth changed. I grew up mainstreamed and always thought those who went to the Deaf schools were lower than average intelligence ..boy was I wrong. I and the other teachers push our students hard. We use the public school curriculm.

Maybe it depends on each school and their philosophy but not all Deaf schools provide less quality education.

If one looks at the statistics and base their opinions on the statistics alone, they are missing the big picture. More than half of the students who graduate from the Deaf schools enter them at a later age after falling so far behind in other programs. In my 5 years as a teacher, I see that as a common but disturbing trend.

I wish I had gone to the Deaf school and I remember I did express wanting to go when I was in middle school only to be told that I was too smart for it. Looking back, those educators were sorely wrong and as a result, my self-esteem almost got completely destroyed cuz I missed out on so much on everything being mainstreamed all day.

My brother attended and graduated from the Deaf school in my hometown and now he is pursuing his Master's at a highly ranked college on the Eastern shore. He is halfway completed so if the Deaf school where he attended failed him, he wouldnt be where he is now. I am glad he wasnt mainstreamed cuz for sure the mainstreamed program would have failed him cuz the attitude from my mainstreamed program was that Deaf people who lack oral skills are "dumb" and my brother was unable to develop oral skills. For sure, he would have been placed in a class with other children with MR , LD or ED. I had good oral skills so therefore I was "smart" according to the specialists at my school which was pretty bullcrap to begin with.
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Bold statements. Been there and done there, only that I really wanted to go into the Deaf school when I was in the mainstream high school. For the simple fact was that maybe my mother may not wanted me to go to the Deaf school even if the Super told my mother that I was too smart and felt that I would pass with flying colors. I was soooo upset and unhappy about not attending the Deaf schools. I felt forced to be in the mainstream school until graduation and I had been frustrated trying to understand what the teachers and the hearing students talked about in the classrooms.

I never got good grades just C there, D in another and once or twice F in my report card. I wanted so bad to have good grades just like my smart hearing sister in the same high school I was in. She had all the good luck on getting a good grades while I don't. That make me the jealous type of my sister being so lucky.

That is why I had needed to go into the Deaf school so that I can understand what the lessons was talked about and get the most awesome grades. That is the most important thing to me. Why made my life miserable and suffered so much? I felt like punched a punching bag so that I can get my frustration out. :)
 
All of these stories from deaf adults...so many, all across the board. Yet, we are still being unheard about the downsides to the so-called mainstreamed education.

And I often wonder...who is really deaf when it comes to deaf education?
 
the deaf school allowed me to go to a nearby college to take a couple of classes per week while learning social skills and just being myself.
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And one wonders if more deaf schools publicized that they did something like this, if they would see a HUGE uptick in enrollment. I really think that a lot of parents of solotaires are SO beyond sick of dealing with completely clueless admins, who do not know how to educate dhh kids, beyond the "Front Row, FM device and speech therapy" triad.
That may work for some kids, but .......
 
For some reason i cant make a new post, but this question relates to this post.

How do people born deaf and blind learn?
I know the story of Helen Keller, though not born that way, and how people can learn to associate words with objects. Like, I understand how they can feel a chair and know how to write c-h-a-I-r, and I can see how they may know the words to absolute every object in the world. But how do they learn so much as to be able to understand such stuff that aren't objects like feelings, or even more so...ideas. even to attend college and stuff. This may sound weird to you that I'm asking, hopefully not disrespectful, and I'm sure there is a simple answer that I'm just not putting together in my head myself. But can someone please explain?
 
I love public schools more than deaf school. I was not very happy kid at deaf school and I was not only one. You think it has to do with education only? Not ture,I had to deal with other deaf kids who were so emotionally f&**ed up. I fought alot there becaues i won't take any bully kids nor deal with some kids who were so sick in their mind, Some of them ended up in mental hospital or in prison for murder. I would never put my deaf kids there at all. Kids belong to home. Sorry you guys think you guys went worst at mainstreamed but you have no idea how we deal with those at Deaf school. I had one classmate who committed suicide one week after he graduated from deaf school. I knew one deaf kid who went to Fremont and he was being bully by those kids and he had to pulled out and put him in other deaf school. Now I read here, saying we are older and we do not know things about deaf school today. Please give me break, if you say so then how come they did not get high school diploma if they do not pass exit exam. Nothing is change or new to me.
 
jazzy said:
I love public schools more than deaf school. I was not very happy kid at deaf school and I was not only one. You think it has to do with education only? Not ture,I had to deal with other deaf kids who were so emotionally f&**ed up. I fought alot there becaues i won't take any bully kids nor deal with some kids who were so sick in their mind, Some of them ended up in mental hospital or in prison for murder. I would never put my deaf kids there at all. Kids belong to home. Sorry you guys think you guys went worst at mainstreamed but you have no idea how we deal with those at Deaf school. I had one classmate who committed suicide one week after he graduated from deaf school. I knew one deaf kid who went to Fremont and he was being bully by those kids and he had to pulled out and put him in other deaf school. Now I read here, saying we are older and we do not know things about deaf school today. Please give me break, if you say so then how come they did not get high school diploma if they do not pass exit exam. Nothing is change or new to me.
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I'm sorry to learn you were not happy with the deaf school you went to but I highly doubt all deaf schools are like that.
 
Joey, I am glad your mom is letting you goto to FSDB. I graduated from there with a "Standard Diploma" Not a certifcate of completion.
 
I was not very happy kid at deaf school and I was not only one. You think it has to do with education only? Not ture,I had to deal with other deaf kids who were so emotionally f&**ed up. I fought alot there becaues i won't take any bully kids nor deal with some kids who were so sick in their mind, Some of them ended up in mental hospital or in prison for murder. I would never put my deaf kids there at all. Kids belong to home. Sorry you guys think you guys went worst at mainstreamed but you have no idea how we deal with those at Deaf school. I had one classmate who committed suicide one week after he graduated from deaf school. I knew one deaf kid who went to Fremont and he was being bully by those kids and he had to pulled out and put him in other deaf school. Now I read here, saying we are older and we do not know things about deaf school today. Please give me break, if you say so then how come they did not get high school diploma if they do not pass exit exam
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. Jazzy, I think back then your experiance was true. But I also think that there were a TON of problems back then that were due more to deaf schools being like large scale insistutions, and lumping kids with emotional issues in with emotionally healthy kids. Like back then were there programs for kids with emotional/mental issues? There are now. I mean I do remember reading in a book about ....who's that Deaf family that lived on an isolated Oregon farm? The one where the kid thought until they were three, that hearing referred to a person who couldn't sign? Anyway, he said that there were some WILD kids in the dorms, as well as kids who were just babysat. I'm not saying that the deaf schools are perfect..Far from it. I do however think that comparing Deaf School of today to your experiance is like comparing foster families and the foster system to the orphanages of the 1940's. Reform is slow in coming yes....And jazzy, I believe that kids have the right to a contiunum of placement, which can change as time goes on.
Nobody is all " Send ALL deaf kids to Deaf School." We're more fighting for it as a viable option for dhh kids. ..both as a day program or even dorming it.
Like when you were young, it was very common for kids to go off to live at school at a young age. A lot of them had emotional issues due to poor communication with their families. So of course they'd be messed up emotionally. Now it's very unusual for kids to go off to live at school at a young age. You know, I was horrfied when my friends told me that there were four year olds in the dorms when they were dorming it (they went as teens) I do think if at all possible, kids should live at home and attend a regional program, or their parents should move closer, until they either have a good foundation for the mainstream or are old enough for dorming it. (like say middle school and above)
I also think that a lot of older Deaf adults may not understand that most kids attending deaf schools are products of the mainstream. There is a small population of DODA and some deaf of hearing who have always attended Deaf School, but overall most Deaf Schools are dealing with the mess made by the mainstream. Yes, the Deaf Schools were awful back when you were there...and I do think that a lot of kids can benifit from regional day programs or magnet schools...but Deaf Schools should be an option.
 
and jazzy, we have a bunch of people on the forum who tried Deaf School after being mainstreamed, and they loved it. I think that says something.
I think you're right in a lot of ways....and I think there were tons and tons of problems with the Deaf Schools back in the day. We're not negating your experiance. But the thing is, we need to REFORM and fix those problems. They aren't exclusively a "deaf school" problem. Believe it or not.
I think you'd be really surprised at how far deaf schools have come. We realize you come from a generation where it wasn't that unusual for kids to live at Deaf School. And it was also a generation where Deaf Schools tended to offer really bad educations, and where oversight of the schools were really really bad. Not to mention that most Deaf Schools until the 70's were oral first, and then ASL...and a lot of kids didn't get into the system until they were toddlers.
I think too that older adults don't realize that low expectations exist in the mainstream as well. Back when older adults were in the system, mainstreamed kids were thought of as the smart ones. Unfortunatly, now that's changed. A lot of us are lumped in with the Resource Room kids if we don't do really well with the minimal Dhh accomodnations. Remember most maisntreamed teachers (including sped teachers) have NO clue how to teach kids like we were.
 
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