Скачать или смотреть LEAD-K Mich Update 5/12/2017

Transcript: Hi - I’m here again for Part Two

Some of you may have already seen Sheri or Julie from the National Lead K Group’s recent vlog. They discussed various groups all over the nation that are anti-LeadK Bills. I can verify that it’s true here in Michigan.

In my last vlog - I spoke briefly about our stakeholder meeting last spring. I didn’t go into much detail but I will now.

Three Michigan Legislators held a stakeholder meeting. They asked various groups to send up to 3 representatives each.

The Michigan Lead-K and Michigan Deaf Association sent three representatives. Two were Deaf themselves. One was a hearing educator who was involved in Deaf Education for over 40 years.

The DeafBlind community sent two representatives. One was a DeafBlind person and the other a parent of a DeafBlind child.

Michigan Hands and Voices sent 3 representative. One was the Director of Hands and Voices. The other two were parents of oral deaf children. Both parents were also audiologists.

ABG had 3 representatives. One AGB rep was a well known attorney in the Detroit Deaf Community. That attorney is also a parent of an oral deaf child. The other two AGB representatives were also audiologists.

The National Cued Speech Association sent 3 representatives. Two were Deaf Cued Speech users and the third rep was also an audiologist.

The Hearing Loss Association sent two representatives. Both hard of hearing adults.

At the meeting, the Legislators presented their rewritten 2017 Lead-K Bill draft. We had already gotten the draft before this meeting.

Some background information. In 2016 - there was a Lead-K Bill, House Bill Numberr 6005. The bill was introduced late fall but did not get picked for a vote. The bill died at the end of the year.

Bill Number 6005 died but the Lead-K Bill itself was carried over to 2017. In order to get a new House Bill Number - there has to be some editing of the bill. Bills can't be exactly the same. Other groups had already viewed the 2016 bill and lobbied their legislators to include the changes they wanted.

Now back to that stakeholders meeting where we went over the draft.

Members of the Lead-K committee were appalled. Our original bill, on the front had a section with the words “ ASL and English Language Assessment”. The 2017 draft - had “ASL and English Language Assessment” replaced with “Languages and Communication Modes” We were upset. The word “Languages” is too broad. It covers all languages such as French, Spanish, and Arabic. That was not the original intent of the Lead-K Bill

Our original intent was to focus on two languages. ASL and English.

And Communication Modes?! Communication Modes are not languages. Communication modes are not the intent of the Language Acquisition bill.

Communication modes are are different techniques that are used to access the English language. English is a language. Yes. But Communication Modes are not languages in itself. They are techniques.

Our original intent of our first bill was lost in the new draft. The other groups twisted things around to get what they wanted.

We stood our ground and demanded that the words ASL be mentioned in the front of the bill - not hidden in the back under definitions.

All throughout our discussions, the other representatives never used the word “ASL”. They treated it as a dirty word and used different terminology.

While we were all discussing this - our legislators sat and listened.

Then all of a sudden one Legislator announced that the words “ASL” be on the front of the bill!

The HLA, Cued Speech, AGB, H&V representatives were all visibly upset at the table. We all were seating at a long and narrow table - almost everyone at the table was outraged.
i was seated at the front of the table and could see their reactions while this legislator proclaimed - ASL must remain at the front and center of this bill

That was an eye opener for me. I knew at that moment. All the other groups at that meeting have been anti-ASL from the start.

They still continue to sweep ASL under the rug. Placing stronger emphasis on English speech and lipreading mastery. It was clear at the meeting.

It was a horrible experience.

That’s why we’re having this rally on June 13th. Legislators will watch and see how much support ASL has in our community. Numbers matter. There must be MANY people there.

I’m asking each and every one of you - supporters of this Lead-K Michigan Bill to please show up on June 13th.

Thank you for watching.