Rejected Comments
Greetings!
I have been receiving powerful messages that I had to reject. They were not acceptable because of the attacks on individuals/groups working for/at RSD. However, these messages can be posted as long as the writers leave out inappropriate comments. One way to throw out inappropriate comments is to have a neutral person read and edit the message. Edited messages can be resubmitted for posting if they are deemed as acceptable.
Thank you!
21 Comments:
I am glad to read that you make wise decisions to reject some messages... I was getting discouraged at the amount of negative blogs being approved for reading.
As a deaf parent of deaf children who attend RSD, my children are doing very well, functioning at and above their grade level... all because RSD and I have good relationship, both of us wanting the best for the children.
I do hope that more parents would take time to think and be more rational... not every school is perfect, but the common ground is the best interests of deaf children.
Good luck.
I find your suggestion about "more parents would take time to think and be more rational" to be patronizing to us who have not had good relationships with their children's teachers and administrators like you do. You probably represent the 65%-75% of satisfied RSD parents. How about the other 25%-35%? Parents who have been negative in this blog have made such comments out of love for their children. While I agree with you that every school is not perfect, RSD needs SIGNIFICANT improvement.
By the way, if you are so happy with what RSD has done for your children, why did you visit this site? What did you anticipate on seeing/hearing?
There is no such a thing as a perfect school but we can always strive to make it better. RSD teachers have worked hard to ensure that my deaf children is reading at or above grade level. My daughter who is 6 is able to write pages and pages of her own creative book and read chapter books. My son is taking one grade advancement in math and is reading a bit above the grade level. RSD teachers have done their job to provide differentiated instruction and continue to challenge each student. I find the curriculum satisfying especially when communicating with the teacher about my children's academic goals. However, academic success is made much more possible by having strong parent involvement. For the past few years, I barely see more than 8 parents participating in PSA. You can't possibly place 100 percent blame on RSD. We know that modern research shows that parent involvement is the number one cause to student's success in academic.
Now I am not saying RSD is doing perfectly fine or else we would not be reading this. As we know, there is always room for improvement. It would be nice to see a much more bicultural-bilingual (bi-bi) program offered at RSD and increased number of communication (separate from speech) teachers who are fluent in ASL and ASL specialists. Currently, RSD pre-school to 3rd grade teachers are using a Fairview program to bridge English using ASL and that is a good start. Some parents have expressed interests in having RSD to follow the bi-bi philosophy. We need to be more aware of the modern research of this program. We can suggest RSD to look into this program and have a workshop about this.
But how to get things started? Just simply show up at the PSA meeting and brainstorm your ideas. Venting out your frustrations on the blog doesn't help even listening about years and years ago about your RSD experiences. What good does this do anyway? We are hurting our children/students more that way.
We just need to be more proactive and educate parents more thoroughly on how to ensure their child's academic success. Yes, RSD needs to change but it is not possible to do it without your involvement. Hope to see you at the PSA meeting this month! The date will be announced.
Dear Blog and Readers:
Like most Schools for the Deaf, the majority of students' parents are hearing. They regard the administrators, teachers and other staff as "the experts" in deafness, deaf education and their own children. This may be somewhat true, but the reality is that a parent should be the child's 'expert', and hearing parents are intimidated by deafness and by the communication challenges, and sometimes may feel "satisfied" because they do not have to deal with many issues that are handled by the professionals (and para-professionals) at RSD (or any other such School).
I am not personally knowledgeable about current RSD administration or staff, but the history of Deaf Institutions is not very good: they have been environments that do not empower the child or parents, and there have been many verified and yet-to-be addressed issues of abuse, control and inappropriate methods of dealing with the kids. You would think that a deaf administrator would bring an end to the problems, but that is often not the case: there is so much invested in the position, the authority and holding onto the job that the individual's ethics and standards get lost.As has been said many times before: "Power corrupts, and absolute power corrupts absolutely." As someone who works with victims and survivors of violence and abuse, I look forward to the day when deaf children can attend school in an environment that is safe and healthy, and then go home to parents who can communicate with them so well that there is no mystery about what is being said and done in the schools.
Responding to these comments:
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Venting out your frustrations on the blog doesn't help even listening about years and years ago about your RSD experiences. What good does this do anyway? We are hurting our children/students more that way.
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Thank you for not validating my experiences from years and years ago. Teachers who have the 1970's mentality are still at RSD. Does this help you get the idea of my concerns now? What about the blog entry of more recent examples of lack of safety/abuse--the teacher who has drinking problems and the staff hurting a student in public??? How about the gym teacher who was fired last fall?!!
What about a parent who has decided to pull out his son of RSD recently because of the following incident? This parent was called by the school to pick up his son due to his behavior, so he came to the school to get him. He saw restraining of his son in progress. The involved staff saw him watching and asked him, "How long have you been there?" "Long enough" was his reply. Yikes!
Can you imagine your six year-old child witnessing this incident or being taught by a teacher who has drinking problems?
This blog remains as much an open forum as I can possibly make it, because I believe everyone should be able to speak their mind and hopefully learn from others. That process goes both ways, though.
Everyone needs to lighten up. RSD is the best school for deaf children in the Rochester area.
I feel blessed that our child is able to attend.
Everyone stop whining and get involved if you feel the need.
Itis easiest to complain and is most difficult to participate and make a difference.
I don't need to be lectured. I attended a best Deaf school in out state. I also have been visiting many Deaf school nationally through sport events and visiting my friends. I think I have visited at least 20 Deaf schools. I haved to admit RSD is much worst based on how the administrator runs the school. RSD is no democracy. All students are being suppressed in every way. Take a look at Student Body Government organization, it is gone due to lack of student's participants. RSD is suitable for students with special needs such as add, adhd, learning disability,
emotional, behavior, and etc. Except for the normal students that are suffered most! That is why I took my child out of RSD and put him in a mainstream school. Now he is much happy. I will let him to speak out...
To: Faculty, Staff, Parents and Alumni of Rochester School for the Deaf
I understand some of you feel that RSD could be improved, and you hope this blog would enforce Mowl and the school board to investigate the complaints that you have filed but they failed to acknowledge your concerns.
Other than enforcing them to address the misconducts among some teachers, what do you hope to accomplish for deaf children at RSD?
I believe if you include a mission and list what you want to enhance RSD would be propitious to your movement.
The Deaf Anonymous
No one deserves to be treated in an abusive fashion in any such educational environment or elsewhere whether if it is in the past or in the present. Fortunately, there are today's laws that are much more stricter to enforce any sort of abuses. We need to realize that what people have commented about what they heard about absues can be a one-sided story. We dont know the full facts.
Usually, restraining is allowed among staff who has been trained especially when dealing with emotionally disturbed students. It seems to me that professional staff member took necessary steps in order to prevent from one hurting himself or to the others.
As for the teacher who has drinking problems, you have no idea what kind of teacher she is. She has a great reputation as a teacher and known to promote literacy among young students. She is not known to be drunk when teaching as it only happens when she is out of work and that is none of our business. Again, we don't know the facts what really happened but I do know that it is not possible for a drunken teacher to teach and that no RSD adminstrator will allow it happen.
Yes everyone has a right to say what they want in the blog but I am not interested to hear about alleged accusations or slander that are not proven as facts.
She is not known to be drunk when teaching as it only happens when she is out of work and that is none of our business.
Response:
Are you sure that she did not drink on the job? She has been reported to the administrators. Yes, it is our business if we can smell her alcohol breath in the classroom.
Oh yes! It is definetely our business if we can smell her alcohol breath in the classroom. She has been reported so many times to her Adminstrator. Nothing had been done... We all know that she is a GREAT teacher but yet this problem may affect or restrict our deaf children's learning!!!
I didn't RSD has happy hour...What time and what building....woohoo
As my being RSD Alumni and former RSDAA Board Member, my suggestion is to set up meetings in each category: Parents, Teachers, Teacher Aides, Students and Alumni (not combined all together). Each of them should highlight / brainstorm their concerns / issues in a proper professional way.
Next step is to set-up a meeting with three (3) delegates of each category. Layout all concerns / issues on the table and prioritize the issues.
Next step is to set-up with RSD Board members on going….
Next step is to set-up with Superintendent Dr. Mowl.
Thank you.
One of my graduate students wrote a wonderful summary of the evolution of "communication methods" in US Deaf Education. I asked her for permission to post here and she kindly agreed. While it is long for a blog comment - i think it is worthy of printing, posting, passing along. It seems particularly relevant to this discussion.
Peace,
Patti Durr
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Written By Rachel Lewis
Teacher and Graduate Student, Masters of Science in Secondary Ed (MSSE at NTID/RIT)
Deaf education in the United States has utilized five major communication methods over time: ASL and written English, methodical signing, oralism, the combined method, and simultaneous communication. Each has had both proponents and opponents, and each was shaped and influenced by various external forces. These forces affected the development and spread of these different methods.
ASL and written English is the main approach of those pursuing the Bilingual/Bicultural philosophy. The language of the classroom is ASL, with written English taught as a second language. As skill in written language is developed, it can be used as another language of instruction to varying degrees (reading from textbooks and such). This is somewhat a resurrection of the method used in the early days of American Deaf Education, which in turn was a reflection of methods in use at the Paris school in the early nineteenth century. The difference was that, initially at least, they used what is termed here as methodical signing — essentially a signed form of the spoken language.
In France, this was the original method of communication devised by L’Epée, putting the signs in the order of the spoken language (French) with the “methodical” signs being invented signs to provide the missing pieces of grammar — articles, tense, etc. These were revised for use with English when Clerc came to America with Thomas Gallaudet, but by 1834, through the work of Roch-Ambroise Bébian, methodical signs gave way to natural sign language in France as well as America (When the Mind Hears, p. 119). Bébian believed — as William Stokoe later proved — that a natural sign language (whether ASL or LSF) could stand on its own without the encumbrances of methodical signs.
This method of instruction by sign language was wiped out, however, by the overpowering spread of oralism after the Milan Conference of 1880, where oralism was declared to be the preferred method of educating the deaf. Speech and lip/speech-reading are the focus of the oralist method, and traditionally signing of any kind was strictly prohibited, although a few such as A.G. Bell were known to utilize fingerspelling. This was understandably attractive to many hearing parents (who account for roughly 90% of parents of deaf children), since if their child could learn to talk and read lips, they could interact “normally” with the family, and the family wouldn’t have to learn a “strange” new language in a different mode.
When oralism initially emerged in America during the mid-nineteenth century, a hazy sort of compromise was given by Edward Miner Gallaudet — the “combined” method. What precisely this meant is somewhat unclear, other than that it involved both signing and speech. It may have meant signing for all, and speech for those who seemed to have the aptitude for it. It may have meant a variety of simultaneous communication, though it seems signers of those times recognized the impossibility of doing both at the same time. Or it may have simply meant signing and speech were both used, always separately, in varying proportion and situations. This compromise failed to hold up to the pressures of the oralists, and was overrun by oralism in the early twentieth century.
However, in 1965, a congressional report called the Babbidge Report reviewed the state of deaf education and declared the predominant oral method a failure. While oralism persevered (and indeed is alive and growing again today), it diminished for a time. Thanks to the research of William Stokoe, declaring that American Sign Language truly is a language in its own right, signing slowly found its way back into the classroom. Under the guise of the “total communication” philosophy, though, the method of the classroom soon came to be simultaneous communication — speaking while signing. Since one can’t sign ASL and speak English at the same time any more than one can speak English and write French at the same time, the form of signing that emerged was a new kind of methodical signs: the various forms of manually coded English. These were developed in the hopes of helping deaf students be better able to learn English, but eventually they were passed off as “sign language” and a model for a first language for deaf children. Again, this was attractive to hearing parents, as it’s easier to learn a new code for a familiar language than to learn a new language. Another goal of simultaneous communication is to increase English literacy (also a claim of oralism), but the language model provided under such a method is dubious at best. I’ve seen for myself that one of the two modes will suffer and be incomplete, and generally it’s the signing that lacks. This means the only complete signal from the delivery end is speech — the very signal that is certain to be incomplete at the receiving end.
In the 1980s and 1990s, while the establishment looked ahead for new improved methods or ways to fix recently used methods, the Deaf community looked further back. The time around the Deaf President Now movement marked the emergence of Deaf culture into the public eye, if only for a little while. The nineteenth century had provided many well-educated Deaf individuals, literate in both English and ASL; why not turn to what worked then, and what the Bilingual Education Act affirms is the correct course for minority-language-speaking children in this country? Thus emerged the Bilingual/Bicultural philosophy. Yet this may not be as attractive to hearing parents, especially those who are uninformed regarding Deaf Culture and ASL.
More attractive to many hearing parents is the idea of cochlear implants, which has been the avenue of oralism’s rebirth. The scientific community claims that early implantation and early access to spoken language can lead to good receptive skills and intelligible speech. Some look forward eagerly to possible “cures” for deafness. With all the advances in technology and medicine, the divide between cultural and pathological views of deafness becomes wider than ever.
most movements for social / institutional change develop a few (3-5) goals / demands
the listing of 10 might be too long and folks and focus could get lost.
clear, simply, concrete goals are often best when keeping ur eye on the prize
themes that have emerged from the RSDblog posts:
1. safety
2. bilingual / bicultural education
(this would require skilled teachers who use ASL and raise the expectation for students' intellectual growth)
3. access to informaiton
-teachers / staff signing in public areas
-RSD website / forum with parents and community members - dialogue beyond PTA meetings
4. hire X number of ASL specialist
I think posts that expose areas of concern for RSD's health, well-being and growth are not necessarily petty or negative. To post notes about personal past experiences, observations, and concerns require a level of CARE and COURAGE. All institutions can be improved just as all individuals can be. None of us grow without input and guidiance.
Courage, commitment, and compassion r needed by all.
peace
patti durr
community member
Good morning, Parent of a fifth-generation Deaf family.
Let me remind you again and again that there are concerned parents out there who have been having problems with RSD. You and others are the EXCEPTION. You are very, very lucky to have a wonderful relationship with your children's teachers. It is human nature that we have a tendency to favor those who favor us, even if we don't mean to. Regardless, keep up the hard work.
It's really sad that you are scolding some of us for not taking action and belitting RSD and its staff. Your statement "that shows me the majority of bloggers have minimum respect for others, getting kicks out of negative remarks" is misleading. On the one hand, some entries are negative. Apparently, there are people who needed to vent for therapy and to start a healing process for themselves. On the other hand, there are entries that are helping us understand what exactly is going on in order to determine what actions should be taken.
You are right that I should not have dwelled on my past. I regret that I was not clear on the issue of "intimidation of hearing parents," using my past experiences as examples. I apologize that you "got scorned" by me. Apology accepted? We do not need any divisions among us who have the same vision of RSD (an ASL/English education).
Assuming that I am forgiven, let me ask you a few important questions:
1) What should parents and others do when they share their concerns and issues with Dr. Mowl and they are not taken seriously?
2) Where do you exactly propose we meet? We are "all eyes/ears" to your suggestions.
I would like to bring one more important point. As you mentioned, there are some hearing parents who feel overwhelmed and helpless. I agree! Let's not overlook another group--there are some d/Deaf parents who are limited by English proficiency to communicate with their children's teachers not knowledgable in ASL. Don't forget this group. I'm sure you saw that entry by one person who commented on weak English skills of d/Deaf writers in this blog site. That was downright MEAN--you agree? It is evident that it was written by someone at RSD, so some of us are "getting scorned" by RSD as well.
Let me close this on a POSITIVE note. There are some GOOD teachers and staff at RSD. For example, there is a hearing male teacher in middle school who is respectable, dedicated and sensitive, and many Deaf regard him very highly.
Thank you for your time in reading this entry. I look forward to hearing back from you.
Lawsuits do not always help, leaving a bad aftertaste. Lawsuits should be always the last resort. That is why I feel that the "top" administration should be more visible, since they reflect RSD. I hope they'd be able to step up to the challenge to make RSD more welcome, warm, inviting place for anyone, and be able to follow the important academic trends in the deaf education
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I'm sorry to say that you are wrong because the administration already left us a “bad aftertaste.” The administration built the walls between us and among themselves in RSD community. Dr. Mowl is not a leader we are looking at for RSD anymore. Dr. Mowl left his staff and teachers a "bad aftertaste." It is a perfect sense to set this blog up since Dr. Mowl turned blind and deaf to our reasonable requests or complaints. Right now, the “top” administration reflects RSD in a bad light. No longer will Dr. Mowl be a role model for the Deaf. Right now, the board of directors is in the hot water because they can be reflected in a bad light since they stand behind Dr. Mowl blindly.
I hope you do not mind that I am not perfect in English or write well.
I am just opening for a suggestion that I feel RSD need many of students' voice to be hear because during the day at school (a most common true facts) the students know more of what happening in the school than the adult. I do agree with some of you that parents should be more involve in the PSA meeting, although remember not all parents may be able to go to the meeting for any good reason. There are some parents who live very far from RSD so is it possible for them to come? Maybe or maybe not. I hope I am giving you an idea to visualize of what can make RSD a better school. I know that RSD have lots of technology that help hearing impaired students and give them foundation for their education. As you know we are all human and human are not perfect.
"We come to love not by finding a perfect person but by learning to see an imperfect person perfectly." - Sam Keen
If we want to stride to make a better future for RSD, then we all have to take action in order to make RSD better.
"Conflict cannot survive without your participation." -Wayne Dyer
"It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently."
-Warren Buffett
So, I want you all who have read this to think about the reputation of RSD and your participation is very important which include the students, teachers, faculty, staff, Board of Director, staff, parent, etc.
I also reccommend the club (if possible) called Safe School Ambassador which will be able to prevent most crisis as possible for students and adults involvement. This program is for people who take action in school especially for students to prevent crisis taking place in school and it can be outside of school which may be necessary like for an example bus, other part of the school campus, during school sport game that is not in RSD, etc.
I am finish for now and I have more to say for who is willing to listen to me.
Thank you for reading this, I really appreaciate that.
*Remember this phrase:
"Nothing Change Nothing."
In order to change you have to do something.*
Hi all,
This is RSDAA President here. My name is Patti Canne. I AM a proud RSD Alumni! RSD is and has always been a second home to me. I have many fond memories of RSD while growing up. My sympathies still go to many Alumni members or any other parents who had gone so much pain or frustrations in the past. I have been approached so many times with many different concerns brought up by the Alumni members, parents, and/or Staff.
First of all, pls allow me to correct something below here..
Someone quoted "We need you RSDAA to help RSD grow in the right direction... it is your time to step in and to shine, not to belittle RSD and RSD staff."
I would like to correct this. RSDAA is just an organization here.If you were referring this to the RSDAA Board members, I would like to clarify that we, the RSDAA Board members did NOT or would belittle RSD and RSD staff at all. We totally have nothing to do with the whole situation. Besides that, most of the Board members are RSD Staff members and we care about the students.
Yes, we, the RSDAA Board are all concerned about this whole thing.It is our job to make sure RSD students are given the best education as possible and to have their needs met if possible. We, the Board did our job over the weekend to discuss about the concerns happening on at this time. We are looking forward to working with the PSA, Staff Association, and the Union representatives as well as with Dr. Mowl and the Board as a TEAM to go over those concerns and see what or how we can improve RSD. Yes... every school in this nation has flaws and sometime it does need to take few organizations' attention to go over those concerns and repair them together. We all need to think about our future Deaf students/children.They need us. FYI, RSD Alumni will always be a part of our future Deaf students/children's lives after they graduate.
So, let's roll up our sleeves and work together. Also, let's make RSD the best and #1 school as ever!
See you at the Town meeting.
Patti Canne
A proud RSD Alumni member
"There are some parents who live very far from RSD so is it possible for them to come?"
Any possibility to use VP at the town meeting? There are hearing parents from out of town/county with VPs because of their D/HOH kids. Or are there other technology we can use to broadcast the town meeting to hearing (and Deaf) parents on their computers?
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