Cochlear Implant - Part 1

In 1963, when I lost my hearing, my doctor said, "Don't ever let anybody operate on your ears." He said that some day scientists would develop the technology to bypass the cochlea and send sound directly to the auditory nerve, and that this would work for me. He also said, "You'll probably read about it first in the Readers' Digest."

What the doctor was describing in the early 60s is today's cochlear implant. I've never read about it in the Readers' Digest (which I generally don't read at all). But because I work in publishing related to deafness, I've read plenty about cochlear implants since the first ones were manufactured and implanted. I even wrote a review of Beverly Biderman's fine book WIRED FOR SOUND in the September/October 1999 issue of Perspectives:

http://clerccenter.gallaudet.edu/products/perspectives/sep-oct99/carew.html

I'm talking about this because a week ago, I went to the Listening Center at Johns Hopkins in Baltimore for a preliminary qualification interview, the first step in applying for a cochlear implant. Not everyone who wants to get a cochlear implant is a good candidate for one. If you wear properly fitted hearing aids and still miss more than half of the words, that's one qualification. If you can pay attention, solve problems, and remember things, that's another one. The psychological evaluation is necessary because doctors have learned that hearing with a cochlear implant is an emotional experience, too. If you have heard before (you're late deafened), what you hear with a cochlear implant may be sufficiently weird and different to be disappointing and upsetting. One recipient said, "Everyone sounds like Daffy Duck!" It takes months if not years to LEARN TO HEAR again with a cochlear implant. I know that--and I've always been able to understand Daffy Duck, no problem. I don't have any objections to this intellectually, but how I'll feel about it may be another matter.

Ryan, the young audiologist who interviewed me, reminds me a lot of my grandson Joe--he's smart and has a lively, gentle sense of humor. He said the quality of my speech told them I passed one of the most important basic requirements: my hearing nerve itself is still in good shape. Even though for years doctors have classified me as having "nerve deafness," that term is a misnomer. What makes me deaf is that my hair cells have been destroyed, not my hearing nerve.

He then asked me why I wanted a cochlear implant. I said that I thought it would be wonderful to hear my young grandchildren's voices. The older ones, Ian and Sean, have become much easier to hear now that their voices have deepened. But that leaves Joe, Sam, George, Annie, and Claire whose normal speech is out of range most of the time. I also said I'd like to be able to hear birds again. Or crickets...leaves rustling in the wind

Next Ryan took me into the sound booth to test how well I can hear with hearing aids when I'm not lipreading (another misnomer...it's really SPEECHreading, since there are many more clues than just what's provided by the lips). As he read one sentence after another and I couldn't understand any of it, I laughed. It was pretty funny, actually; it sounded as if he'd taken all the familiar sounds of English and scrambled them into a new language. He said, "Just take a guess and tell me any of the words you can understand"--still nothing. Finally he said something that sounded vaguely familiar, so I said "Bees! You were talking about bees!" Wrong. The interpreter who was in the sound booth with me said later he'd said "Please pass the meat." For the one other thing that sounded vaguely familiar, and which I identified as "carrots," I was way off the mark. The interpreter said, "I don't know how you got "carrots" out of that one."

The end result was that he said I was a very good candidate for a cochlear implant. I have two more interviews coming up in early January: with the surgeon and with the audiologist again. I also need to schedule an appointment with a shrink for a psychological evaluation interview. Ha. That's easy. I've always been nuts. I can tell them that now.

David Saxner, 2/17/1948 - 11/23/2006

Pre Thanksgiving Poem 2006

(To Medea)

The sunset swirls
Like a suspended boomerang
Many of them
In fact
Skimming atop
The orange red sky
An elevated burning ocean
Cascading down hills
And bare branches
A feast for the eyes
That can satisfy
Any Thanksgiving appetite
As it reflects down
On the land and lake
And in the hearts
Of those capable
Of loving


November 22, 2006


David Saxner sent me an email at noon on Thanksgiving day about the time Medea, his daughter; Ian Denson, her husband and my oldest grandson; and Penny Grillos, Medea's mother, were boarding their plane at O'Hare for their flight to D.C. He said he had just written this poem the evening before, but he wanted to share it with Medea, even though it was a first draft. He asked if I would print it out and give it to her at dinner. Then he left his country home in Galena, Illinois, to go hiking.

I printed it out, wrapped it in a green ribbon, and gave it to her just after they poured the wine. About two hours after dinner, Medea got a phone call from the Sheriff in Galena. He told her that her father had died of a sudden heart attack while that afternoon.

As last acts go, David's was among the best, both moving and typical of his loving spirit.

May he rest in peace.

11/27/06
P.S.
The Chicago Tribune has a story about David today that is truly inspiring. What a loss for all of us.
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/obituaries/chi-0611280146nov28,1,1519907.story

NaNoWriMo...Update!!

Over the finish line at 7:30 this morning. 50,000 words in November 2006!!! Who knew?

Our Own Daily Digest, Vol 1, #7

OUR OWN DAILY DIGEST
“All the New that Fits, We Print” Published Every Thursday, give or take…
November 21, 2006, Volume 1, #7 So it’s Tuesday (again)…so sue me (again)!

HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE (NOTE, I DID NOT SAY “AGAIN”)
Well, finally! The staff advisory committee hit the nail on the head this week, so to speak, when it promulgated their recipe for finding, persuading, and ultimately coercing a well qualified person to take on the (brutally thankless) job of Interim President of Gollyurdef.

One of the key ingredients in this recipe is that [sic] “the Interim President has a leadership style that is composed of a bottoms-up approach and be active with the outside and inside of the community. 'X' shared his views on how academic center approach is very important.” (Do you sense the barbarians are at the gate, possums??)

Your reporter, for one, is mightily reassured to know that the “bottoms-up approach” is now being talked about in public. Instead of the usual griping and grousing about the “top-down approach” in fashion here until recent events dictated a sea change, the staff now are saying that those of us on the bottom of the totem pole get to run the show! What could be more fun than that? Since there is no one lower on the totem pole than your reporter, I’m delighted to lead off by announcing some new RULES AND REGULATIONS GOVERNING OUR EMPLOYMENT AT THE CLERK CENTER. (And no backtalk from the top of the totem pole, please….Your days are not only numbered, they’re in the negative cycle already...as in "O-V-E-R".)

#1: There will be no more talk of this oxymoronic 30-minute “lunch break.” Thirty minutes for lunch is no break. It’s stress-o-rama! The only being who can eat lunch in 30 minutes is a toothless hamster—if there is enough water in his bottle to wash down the food.

#2: “Supervisors” shall have no more than one office apiece, and that windowless and out of sight of the sign-in board. They also shall get lost every Friday afternoon no later than 12:15 p.m.

#3: A good “supervisor” guides with flexibility. The best way to achieve cooperation from one’s staff is to sit on the sofa with an ice cold beverage in hand, put one’s feet up on the coffee table, and observe the goings-on with a benevolent gaze.

#4: Employees’ children and grandchildren are welcome to visit at any time when they are not in school or if the babysitter calls in dead. They may bring DVDs to watch on our TV/VHS/DVD combo unit, but we ask them to please not put their feet up on the coffee table. R.H.I.P. (Rank Hath Its Privilege)

Happy Birthday, Bob!

Happy Birthday, Bob!

Here are the four Dwyer boys, my big brothers: left to right, John Joseph, born March 17, 1922; Robert Mark, born November 22, 1924; Paul Francis, born August 9, 1926; and Eugene Edward, born May 11, 1929. This picture was taken on the front steps of our house at 4906 Sigwart Avenue, Omaha, Nebraska, on January 8, 1933. That means John was 11 going on 12, Bob was 9, Paul was 6 and a half, and Gene was 3 and a half. I did not come along until December 1, 1936.

Bob is #2 in the family and 2nd from the left in this photo. With his blonde hair, he resembles my mother's side of the family. Gene is the other blonde of the four boys, and he also looks like Mom's family. Bob is tall--6'--also like some of my mother's relatives. He's shrunk a bit since then, but hey, he'll be 82 years old this week!

Bob served in the Army Air Force (AAF) (as did John and Paul) during WWII. Like the other boys, he never left the USA. He was in OCS--Officers Candidate School--and the AAF sent him to places like Harvard University, Spokane, and Pocatello, Idaho. It was in Spokane that he acquired a pair of skis that I wrecked the first time I went "skiing" in Fargo. Since there are no hills in Fargo, the only way to go downhill was to find a ditch. Some friends and I went to the river bank, where the ground cuts down to the Red River of the North. I buckled on the skis and went straight downhill into a tree, which broke the tip off one ski. Bob never said a word, although he may not have noticed, anyway. He was seldom home after he left for the Army.

When the war ended, he and John both entered the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis thanks to the G.I. Bill and didn't return to Fargo except on vacations. During this time, they sent their laundry home in a big, green box, and my mother washed and ironed their clothes, and mailed the box back to Minneapolis. On their birthdays, she would bake an angel food cake and frost it with seven-minute frosting and include that in the box, too. (I don't want to think about those clean shirts riding next to those big sticky cakes, but I never heard any cake vs. laundry disaster stories.)

Bob lived at the Alpha Tau Omaga (ATO) house in Minneapolis. ATO was the fraternity he had joined before the war at North Dakota Agricultural College (now North Dakota State University) in Fargo. He was president of ATO at one time, although I don't know whether that was in Fargo or in Minneapolis. Bob has always had a wonderful friendly personality, and with his brains added to that, he's always been an impressive person. I remember staying overnight with my friend Jane, whose house was right behind the ATO house. We'd turn off the lights in her bedroom and watch the goings on in the fraternity house, where they never pulled the shades or even had curtains. Most of what we saw, however, were various young men in t-shirts and khaki pants crossing in front of the windows on their way from hither to yon. We lived in hope of seeing something juicy and scandalous, but we never did. And Bob, by this time, was far away in Minnesota.

Bob's major in college was metallurgical engineering, a field in which he spent most of his adult life and virtually all of that at Honeywell. He later became a values engineer, and he has a plaque that declares him "Values Engineer of the Year." He received this award sometime after 1954, when they moved into the house in Hopkins where Bob still lives, and 1976. He continues to be a popular guy with many longtime close friends.

Bob married Gertrude "Trudy" Ann Schleck of South Milwaukee, Wisconsin, on April 18, 1953.



Here is Trudy in their living room on Christmas Day, 1972. The little blonde guy is Tom. She always had the most wonderful laugh and warm, outgoing disposition. Trudy died of non-Hodgkins lymphoma in 1993, and she is still sorely missed by all. She and Bob had just come back from two weeks in Paris with Trudy's college roommate and her husband. Trudy bragged about how adept Bob had been at guiding them through the Paris Metro.

Bob was one of the "many" older brothers (i.e., John and Bob) I knew I had when I was a small child although I didn't quite know WHO they all were. John and Bob were in high school when we moved to Fargo from Omaha, and they both had jobs before and after school. All of the boys worked for the Nabisco cookie factory in Fargo at one time or another, and at least one of them also worked for Newberry's Department Store stoking the furnace before the store opened in the morning. Since I got up with the daylight and was put to bed immediately after 6 p.m. supper, and they left at 5 a.m. and didn't get home until 7 or 8, I never saw them. Paul and Gene were still in elementary school and kept hours more similar to mine.

When Bob and John both graduated from the University of Minnesota in 1950--John in medicine, Bob in metallurgical engineering--Mom, Dad, and I drove to Minneapolis in our green 1947 DeSoto sedan for the graduation ceremonies. We stayed at Trudy's place, since she lived in a house with several roommates. After Bob and Trudy were married in 1953, they moved to Prospect Park near the U of M campus. Mom, Dad, and I visited there in 1950, also, and we met Bob and Trudy's future landlords. We had Italian spaghetti for dinner in their big dining room that night, and it was the very first time in my life I had ever eaten it. Our meals at home were based largely on fish or game that my dad had caught or shot himself: walleyed pike, mallard ducks, and the fabulous ring-necked pheasant that my mother canned in big glass jars. Mom and Dad grew all our vegetables themselves in our big victory garden on 1st Street North in Fargo. Our basement shelves were stacked full of jars of peas, green beans, and beets. Carrots stayed fine if you kept them in sand, and that’s what we did. We picked potatoes from the fields in Moorhead after the potato growers had harvested what they wanted. We filled several burlap sacks and carted them home in the 1936 Plymouth, our first car after the war.

On the day I entered the convent, September 8, 1954, Bob cooked lunch, my "final" meal in the "world": liver and onions and boiled potatoes. It's one of my favorite meals still, although I rarely eat it any more. He knew I would need something solid to carry me through the day, and it did.

All the while I was in the convent--one month short of five years--Bob and very often Trudy, when she did not have to stay home to care for a sick child, came to visit me on every visiting day, which was one Sunday a month with time off for Lent and Advent. That's certainly beyond the call of duty, and I thank him for it.

Bob and Trudy produced six wonderful children: Ellen, Bob, Jr., Mary Frances, LuAnn, Gretchen, and Martha. Ellen is a nurse; Bob Jr. a school teacher; Mary Fran a pharmaceutical sales rep; LuAnn, a CPA; Gretchen, a retired home economist for General Mills; and Martha...I don't know what Martha is doing right now. She was a pharmaceutical sales rep, then a manager for that company, and now I think she and her husband have started a coffee house franchise (not Starbucks, but another one).

Anyway, Bob has been a model son, sibling, friend, husband, parent and grandparent, and values engineer in his long, productive life. He is a wonderful brother, and if I have mixed up some of the facts, it's entirely my own fault.

Happy 82nd birthday, Bob. Nobody can replace you in our family. I love you.

M.E.

P.S.


Here I am several years later with Mom on the front steps of 4906 Sigwart (notice the house number?). Notice that everyone is always bundled up. Welcome to the Midwest.

The Slate Green Challenge with TreeHugger: Electricity

Dear Sweeties....I get this newsletter in the e-mail every week, and I'm gonna post it here, too, in case y'alls don't read Slate much. Slate is an online magazine that I like, and if you sign onto MSN, you can see the link to it there.

Last week's Slate Green Challenge was bout wearing clothing that reduces our impact on the environment, that is, cotton, linen, wool....natural fibers. That's a hard one, especially now when all the L.L. Bean Christmas catalogs are arriving with all their luscious fleece garments!! Fleece is made out of polyester and that kinda stuff...petroleum derivatives. Ouch! Maybe a nice cashmere sweater instead??

From: Slate and TreeHugger [newsletter@treehugger.com]
Date: Nov 20, 2006 17:03
To: ...
Cc:
Subject: The Slate Green Challenge with TreeHugger: Electricity


Slate Green Challenge with TreeHugger

Welcome to Slate and TreeHugger’s Green Challenge weekly newsletter! This week, we address electricity and gadgets, and what you can do to keep your related CO2 output to a minimum. If you haven’t started the Challenge yet, or if you missed a weekly segment, don’t worry, you can learn what it’s all about ::here or pick up where you left off anytime.

ALL CHARGED UP Most of us take electricity for granted: Flip a switch, and there it is. In lots of ways, that’s a beautiful thing. But behind our well-lit rooms and entertaining flat-screen TVs, the generation of electricity is our country’s largest single source of CO2 emissions overall. That’s because most of our electrical-power supply comes from burning fossil fuels—natural gas, oil, and, especially, coal. While you can’t pick where your energy comes from (unless you move off the grid by installing your own solar or wind power generator, say), there’s plenty you can do to help follow a lower-carbon diet when it comes to electricity usage. Switching out light bulbs for more efficient models, unplugging electronic devices when they're not in use, and choosing energy-saving appliances are few things we suggest in this week’s Green Challenge. We’ve got plenty more tips, too, and not a single one suggests that you live in the dark. ::Slate Green Challenge: Electricity

htgreen_468x60.gif [this is a picture, and if you can figure out how to see it, good]

Last month, Wells Fargo bank purchased enough renewable energy certificates to offset 40 percent of its energy consumption, about equal to removing 75,000 cars from the roads for a year. (The company has also financed $720 million worth of green buildings.) In terms of renewable energy purchased, the move puts them neck in neck with Whole Foods Market, which bought enough credits in 2006 to offset 100 percent of its energy use. ::more and ::more

As our consumption of gadgets such as DVD players, cell phones, MP3 players, and PDAs has increased, so have our country’s greenhouse gas emissions—not to mention our household utility bills. We’re not against modern technology, but we do like the idea of using it wisely. You too? Check out Energy Star’s three-part podcast on the recent explosion of consumer electronics, its effects on energy consumption, and tips for reducing your personal impact. ::more

Founder and president of the Earth Policy Institute and a contributor to TH, Lester Brown knows a few things about improving productivity when it comes to energy. In his book Plan B 2.0: Rescuing a Planet Under Stress and a Civilization in Trouble, he presents realistic solutions to a more sustainable future by outlining simple actions that individuals can take and explaining environmental policy at large. Another eco-spin: the book can be downloaded on-demand for free. ::more

Did you know?

Believe it or not, 40 percent of all the electricity we use in our houses is used to power electronics that are plugged in but aren’t in use. Nationwide, that’s equivalent to the annual output of 17 power plants! You can avoid wasting energy in this way by unplugging electronics from the wall, or plugging them into a power strip that can be switched off completely.

For additionall tips on how to become even more environmentally savvy when it comes to electrical gadgets and power, check out TreeHugger's latest Green Guide, How to Green Your Electricity.

th_banner468x60.gif [Another picture...]


So far, 27,457 Green Challenge participants have pledged a total of 47,705,759 pounds of reductions in CO2 emissions.

Stay tuned for next week’s installment of the Slate Green Challenge, when we celebrate the Holidays.

Special thanks to our friends at I'm Organic, T-shirt prize sponsor for the Green Challenge.

Yours on a carbon diet,
Slate and TreeHugger


Want to learn more about environmentalism or the world at large? Sign up for a TreeHugger newsletter here or get on the Slate train here.

Pssst...If you can convince a few of your friends to get on the Green Challenge program, you’d be making an even bigger contribution to our collective carbon diet. Technically speaking, you wouldn’t lose more carbon pounds yourself, of course, but why not pass this newsletter along to others who might enjoy it?
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Gee....

Recently I got some advice on how to retire successfully (i.e., to survive beyond the first couple of years or so during which many retirees just die from boredom). My advisor even wrote out a cheat sheet for me. Here it is:

#1. Stay engaged. This means stay engaged with LIFE, not engaged to SOMEBODY, although I would think that might take care of the first notion, too. Kill two birds with one stone.

#2. Go where you are needed. I'm so happy to know this. This solves all my problems. All I need to do is sign on as a permanent volunteer to the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, and longevity is mine!

#3. Connect with people. See #2

#4. Maintain/develop a sense of personal power. There's always a trick.

NOW what???

Wot is going on with the Gallaudet faculty NOW? Read this:

A Conflict on Integrity Surfaces
Gallaudet Is Roiled by Charges That Academic Standards Have Been Compromised

By Mary Pat Flaherty and Susan Kinzie
Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, November 9, 2006; B01

As Gallaudet searches for its next president, the university is wrestling with divisions that go beyond the recent protests, with faculty and staff charging that some administrators have compromised academic standards and jeopardized the institution's integrity and performance.

Faculty members were asked by administrators to change grades of several failing students, according to internal documents and interviews. Faculty reports to the board of trustees have warned that the university is admitting students with very low academic skills without giving professors the necessary training and resources to help them.

"There are some students who cannot multiply 4 x 4 and come up with 16 without a calculator," and others who cannot read English well enough to comprehend a basic news story, faculty members reported to the board last year.

The complaints build on criticism earlier this year from the Office of Management and Budget, which concluded in an assessment that "Gallaudet failed to meet its goals or showed declining performance in key areas, including the number of students who stay in school, graduate and either pursue graduate degrees or find jobs upon graduation." The agency labeled as "ineffective" the use of $108 million in annual federal funding that goes to the university -- supplying two-thirds of its budget -- and said that the school needed closer monitoring.

The protesters who forced the ouster of incoming president Jane K. Fernandes last week have driven to the surface these and other painful debates over the school's accountability. Some faculty members say the problems are part of a larger pattern among administrators of hiding weaknesses and keeping enrollment up, even as medical and other changes have expanded educational options for deaf students.

"The unstated fear among many faculty is that the [Gallaudet] administration is [so] desperate" for warm bodies "that they'll go out and yank people off the street who don't have the skills or who are not ready for the college experience," faculty chair Mark Weinberg said, adding that he doesn't want to undermine the school and its many bright students but hopes this can be a turning point for Gallaudet to solve problems.

University officials say the focus on problems ignores Gallaudet's strengths. They deny that there is a pattern of grade-changing or admitting unqualified students and say the federal review minimized the school's unique mission.

Outgoing President I. King Jordan, in a written statement, said that the university remains strong. "Today more than ever . . . it should be clear to all that Gallaudet is far greater than the sum of its parts," he said. ". . . We remain a community united in a common cause."

Since it became a college in 1864, Gallaudet has been the nation's lone liberal arts institution for the deaf and hard of hearing. For many, it also has been a leading cultural center. Critics say its cherished standing has protected it from rigorous scrutiny.

Gallaudet has a "grand tradition" with a hard-to-serve population, noted John H. Hager, assistant secretary for special education and rehabilitative services at the Department of Education. Congress "is always saying nice things about Gallaudet" as it appropriates money for the university. By law, the department is supposed to monitor Gallaudet's performance, but, Hager acknowledged, "we were never in a true supervisory role."
Changing Grades

Faculty and staff cite several examples of occasions when administrators reviewed staff decisions on grades and asked for changes or readmitted failed students.

In one instance, five students who had failed a remedial math course complained to Karen Kimmel, dean of the College of Liberal Arts, Sciences and Technologies. Kimmel questioned the weight given to the must-pass exit exam and whether students were aware of its significance, according to e-mails she sent faculty members.

After a lengthy back-and-forth with math faculty, Kimmel ended one e-mail by saying: "I ask you to pass these students." Two faculty sources, who declined to be identified for fear of reprisals, said that professors later changed grades because they felt pressured by the request.

Kimmel said she was obliged to investigate whether the test requirement was fair. "I would never say 'pass this student,' " she said in an interview. She later said she had been unable to recall the wording of her e-mail. Faculty members, she said, were not coerced by it.

Any grade changes or readmissions were rare and addressed specific student needs, said Fernandes, who was university provost at the time.

In one case, Fernandes intervened when a student failed an internship after walking off the job at mid-semester, faculty sources said. The failure put the student at risk for dismissal. When the student appealed and a member of Congress inquired on his behalf, Fernandes agreed to give him another internship on campus, she confirmed, but said she did so only because a faculty member agreed to closely monitor him.

In another case, a student who had been suspended after failing classes asked to be readmitted. According to faculty sources, the student had had multiple chances to turn things around, but kept cutting classes and did not do the work or attend summer school.

Fernandes said she allowed the student to be readmitted because, once again, a faculty member offered to supervise. In both cases, the students succeeded, she said.

The issue of bending admissions standards came up with the 6-foot-4 basketball player son of Debra Drymalski. He applied to Gallaudet last May but was rejected because of his low English and reading scores. Yet, he received repeated calls from the university's athletics director, James DeStefano, who told her son he could be retested.

"I thought, what kind of college does that? You apply. You get in or you don't and that's that. It just didn't feel right," said Drymalski, of Darien, Wis., who has taught deaf students for 28 years. "This wasn't the right fit for him. He would have struggled and, honestly, I think he would have failed." Her son is attending a technical school and still has trouble in some courses. "I really had to push back," she said, because DeStefano "was very persistent."

DeStefano said his contacts were a genuine attempt to help a student who was "pestering" him about getting into the school. A high school counselor had told DeStefano the student would succeed if given a chance. It is "my job" to advocate for students, DeStefano said. He dropped the matter "once the mother told me to back off."

Last spring, DeStefano confirmed, he sought a grade change for a basketball player who had dropped below the 2.0 grade-point average needed to maintain his eligibility. DeStefano said he asked the faculty member if there was any work the student could do to raise his 1.9 to the 2.0.

DeStefano said the faculty member agreed, the player did some work and the grade was changed.

"I'd say it was fairly common" to ask teachers what students could do to raise a final grade," DeStefano said. "I'm not saying frequently, but it is not uncommon."

Faculty members "have the ultimate authority to grade students," Fernandes said, "and changes should not be made lightly."

Substandard Students

Fernandes said she had intended to raise admissions standards but needed to proceed gradually because "if we just cut off a certain level of students, the university's overall enrollment would suffer and probably not recover."

Gallaudet has been recruiting more aggressively to keep enrollment up, Kimmel said. Beyond medical advances, federal laws now enable more deaf students to attend mainstream schools. Those laws have been "a double-edged sword," she said.

Several faculty members said they suspect that the shrinking pool of potential students has resulted in the school admitting some applicants who previously would not have met standards.

This fall, 41 percent of new students were required to take remedial English and 86 percent needed remedial math, according to the office of enrollment services.

Deaf students who grow up communicating with American Sign Language often need extra help with English because ASL is its own language, not a literal translation of English. And the concentration on learning English often overwhelms math instruction, Gallaudet staff members say.

One perspective among the faculty "is we shouldn't be getting so many developmental students," Weinberg said. "The other is we've got to do better with the ones we have." .

The administration in recent years has boosted the school's honors program, Weinberg noted. But he said challenges remain for faculty members in teaching a student population with an enormous range of abilities. And, he said, officials have tried to play down any weaknesses.

Other faculty members express a lack of trust in an administration they say is heavy-handed and dismissive of complaints.

English professor Christopher Heuer said that more checks and balances need to be in place. "Our current system needs to be reformed so that the wishes of the stakeholders of the Gallaudet campus community are heeded, not just heard," Heuer said.

Faculty vice chair Lois Bragg said the administration has been spinning bad news for years, "trying to hide from the public evidence of low academic standards and absolutely risible admissions policies. . . . The administration has lost all credibility in the campus community."

In its review this year, the OMB noted the university's low graduation rates, which have fallen just below targets that the school pledges to meet. Its 42 percent is an estimate meant to include any student who graduates, regardless of how long it takes. Graduation rates are more commonly based on the number of students who graduate within six years. By that measure, Gallaudet says it averages a 28 percent rate.

Budget officer David F. Armstrong said Gallaudet vigorously objected to OMB's conclusions and it has agreed to a reassessment. He added that accrediting agencies have endorsed the university's programs. OMB's "one-size-fits-all approach," he said, disserves Gallaudet.

Gallaudet students, for example, may take eight or nine years to complete degrees, Armstrong said, and go on to graduate school at very high rates.

Hager, at the Department of Education, said his agency was not vigilant about overseeing the university, partly because the money for Gallaudet "is a small part of our operation here."

Gallaudet, Hager said, "likes their independence," but agreed to a two-day visit in April by Education Department staff. He also said his department would be rigorous about getting timely and complete data from Gallaudet.

"When they knuckled down and got over the emotional reaction [to the OMB report] and got factual, they were set to do the hard work with us," Hager said.

News researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.

You notice how none of "faculty and staff" ever seem to feel there's anything wrong with anyone except for the administration at Gallaudet? They appear to be so deep in their delusions that they can't even see that bad old Jane Fernandes was *gasp* actually working FOR these kids, giving them second and even third chances, assigning faculty members (tut tut) to help them. Has there ever been a time when new deaf and hard of hearing students did not need tons of help to get through a college curriculum? I thought things were getting better recently at Gallaudet in this respect, not worse! Actually, the faculty do get some really fine students: many and maybe even most of the deaf and hard of hearing kids from foreign countries where schools and programs are oral are light years ahead of the Americans, even (and I've noticed especially) in English and in many cases this is perhaps their third or fourth language.

I recall when I first got to Gallaudet, I thought, "Hey...I am a published writer, maybe I could help out in tutoring." (Mad, hysterical laughter) In my very brief career as a tutor, my very first tutee was a deaf midget who had cerebral palsy on top of everything else and could not distinguish between a noun, a verb, an adjective, an adverb, or a hole in the wall. I wound up more or less writing his essay for English 102 or wotever it was, so he could continue with his studies! Is it unusual for tutors anywhere, not just Gallaudet, to take such a "proactive stance"? Not really. Hell, I have written essays across the country for countless hearing housewives who were going back to college and who had no time or ability to even think, much less write. It's how the world works when you're up against it. Anyway, this kid finally got though Gallaudet after about 8 years. I remember on graduation day seeing his big, tall older brother carrying him in his arms back to his dorm because he was too exhausted and in pain to walk any further on his own. He was weeping tears of what...joy? pain? terror at leaving dear old Gollyurdef?

If the Gallaudet faculty expect they are always gonna be served up students needing nothing more than to sit reverently in the classroom while the font of wisdom & knowledge personified spews out the old "one year of teaching and 25 years of the notes," as my first husband used to say, they are definitely lost in space. They should polish up those old CVs and get as far away from there as their two legs and their environmentally challenged SUVs will take them.

Goodies bout Pore Ol' George Allen from Huffpost

Apparently George Allen is gonna concede the Virginia senatorial race to Jim Webb any minute now. Word has it that he has been advised to do so before the FBI starts complaining about certain broken election laws....my my!!

Anyway, the title of this Huffpost post is "Senior Staffer: Allen 'Shell-Shocked,' Sequestered In His Home..."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2006/11/09/senior-staffer-allen-sh_n_33747.html

Here's my #1 favorite comment:

Let's see, did he have his face blown off? Lose an arm or leg? Suffer permanent brain injury? Go bankrupt due to harsher regulations? Go hungry when his student loan interest rate went up? Did someone put him in a headlock and throw him into a window? Ridicule his race in a public event? Hang him out over Niagra Falls? Break his collarbone? Wiretap his phone or Internet communications? Torture him in a covert CIA prison?

Did anyone do to him what his votes and actions have done to others?

Didn't think so.

Good riddance, Hillbilly Bear. Payback is a bitch.

http://www.newsprism.com...

By: narcissisticfibrosis on November 09, 2006 at 03:33pm

-----

#2 favorite:

Senior Staffer: Allen "Shell-Shocked," Sequestered In His Home..."

This is the same GOP neo-con chicken hawk who was such an enthusiastic cheerleader for the "showk and awe" bombing of civilian men, women and children in Iraq. And now he is curled up in a fetal position in his home because he lost an election.

Good-bye Mr. Allen. We have rid ourselves of you finally. Too bad it won't be that easy to rid ourselves of the negative impacts of your actions. But you can't bring back dead soldiers or Iraqi children, nor unring the bell of an illegal invasion and occupation. We will be dealing with the effects of these issues for the rest of our lives. But for the rest of your life Mr. Allen, we will all remember your role in this tragic disaster in Iraq. While your in the fetal position crying, you might want to contemplate that also.

By: moshe on November 09, 2006 at 03:35pm

-----

#3 favorite:

How comic is it that the last two concessions should be" Burns and Allen"? Awww, you younger folks won't get this!

By: morganhill on November 09, 2006 at 03:40pm

[I got it! I got it!! but a course, I ain't younger folks, either]

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#4 favorite:

Word inside the Beltway is that Georgie can have John Warner's seat when he retires in two years. Y'all hear that Virginny? Gives you a chance to reject this Christo-fascist bully-thug-boor all over again. Let's start by investigating those mysterious phone calls threatening Virginia's minorities with arrest and imprisonment if they tried to vote. I guess George didn't know that was going on in his campaign? Right. Wallow in it Sen. Macacawitz. Just try to make a comeback. You turned Northern Virginia blue. Thank You.

By: SirCaustic on November 09, 2006 at 03:52pm

-----


#5 favorite...oh, I give up! They're all wonderful. The URL is right at the top...click on it, and you can read 'em all! Good times, folks!

O Happy Day!!

The Democrats have taken back the Senate and the House!
Rumsfeld is gone!
George Allen is still a cretinous redneck, but now he's not the Senator from Virginia!
A Democrat won Tom Delay's district!
Rick Santorum is gone!
The draconian South Dakota abortion ban failed!
Oh, and how could we forget....the great Martin O'Malley, former mayor of Bal'mer, is now Governor of the State of Maryland! Ah-one and ah-two....hit it, folks!!!

One small fly in the ointment is that Joe Lieberman again will be in the new Senate, though not as a Democrat! You were a lousy, Bush-kissing Democrat, Joe, so good riddance from the party. You've been revealed for the craven neo-Republican you are.

NaNoWriMo

Astute readers of this blog may have noticed the participant's icon waaay at the end next to the site meter. I have joined National Novel Writing Month. My goal is to write a 50,000 word novel by November 30. (Actually, by November 27 or so, since I'm leaving for Paris on the 29th to celebrate the completion of 70 years on this freakin' planet!) Anyway, all I can tell you is that it's a total blast! Nothing like a deadline to wipe out writers' block.

As part of the new novel-writing paradigm in Chez XtremeEnglish, I got a new book in the mail today: Jane Smiley's 13 Ways of Looking at the Novel. Her opening paragraph for "Chapter 10: A Novel of Your Own (1)," reads as follows:

Now that you have decided to begin your novel, you may congratulate yourself. You have not been asked or groomed to write a novel. You have not gone to novel-writing school, nor taken a standard curriculum of preparatory courses [An M.A. from City College's Creative Writing program and a few classes from the Iowa Writers Workshop don't count? Nah.]. Chances are, no one wants you to write your novel--if they say they do, they are just meaning that you should get it over with or get on with it. The people you know actually dread reading the novel you are about to write--they don't want to read about themselves, they don't want to be bored, and they fear embarrassment for everyone. You are, therefore, free.
(from 13 Ways of Looking at the Novel, by Jane Smiley. Copyright 2005. Published by Alfred A. Knopf, a division of Random House, Inc., New York.

Gentle readers, truer words have never been spoken. But I don't care. All I have to do is write 50,000 words in some sort of novelistic form, scramble it [Oh, people cheat and steal our honest work! The same kind of creeps who send viruses to your computer! So we scramble it when we send it in to be verified], and then go from there. Maybe a nother novel next month! I've always said that I wanted to write (and publish) six novels before I die. No time like the present.

Soulforce Urges Compassion for Haggard and Accountability for the National Association of Evangelicals

I received a copy of the following e-mail, shortened here, from my longtime friend Paula, an ex-nun, a widow, and a retired lawyer who works ceaselessly for the cause of GLBT members of the Roman Catholic Church in the diocese of St. Paul, Minnesota. She received this email as a subscriber to Soulforce's mailing list.

Paula does this work not because she considers herself GLBT but because she feels it is the right thing to do. Thanks for sending this, Paula.

Monday, November 06, 2006

Soulforce Urges Compassion for Haggard and
Accountability for the National Association of Evangelicals

Peace Dove(Austin, TX) -- In response to the news that Rev. Ted Haggard has been dismissed by New Life Church and resigned as President of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), Soulforce Executive Director Jeff Lutes urged the gay community to be compassionate and simultaneously called on the leaders of the NAE to claim responsibility for their role in the crisis.

"Rev. Haggard is just one more tragic example of how lives are destroyed by...religion-based bigotry that regularly demeans and demoralizes gay and lesbian people and refuses to acknowledge that we are part of the American fabric, and that many of us form loving families and practice a deep faith in God."

The NAE holds that "homosexuality is a deviation from the Creator's plan for human sexuality." In a 2004 policy statement, the organization opposes legislation that would protect gays and lesbians from hate crimes or employment discrimination on the grounds that "such legislation inevitably is perceived as legitimatizing [sic] the practice of homosexuality and elevates that practice to a level of an accepted moral standard."

Haggard submitted his resignation as President of the NAE on Thursday, shortly after allegations of homosexual activity were aired on Denver talk radio. On Saturday, Haggard was removed as pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs. In a letter to his congregation, Haggard wrote "there's a part of my life that is so repulsive and dark that I have been warring against it for all my adult life." He also wrote that the church's overseers have required him to "submit to the oversight of Dr. James Dobson, Pastor Jack Hayford, and Pastor Tommy Barnett. Those men will perform a thorough analysis of my mental, spiritual, emotional and physical life. They will guide me through a program with the goal of healing and restoration for my life, my marriage, and my family."

In reaction to the unfolding events, Lutes [Soulforce Executive Director] said "Our community's anger at Rev. Haggard's hypocrisy is completely understandable. However, my hope is that our community will take the high road and extend an olive branch of friendship and support when he is ready to fully come out as a gay man. Dobson and the others will counsel him to bury, deny, and repress his sexuality even deeper than before. They will wound his spirit, and he is going to need our prayers and our compassionate message that God loves him, affirms him, and calls him to live his life
openly with honesty and integrity."

--------------------

The goal of Soulforce is freedom for lesbian, gay, bisexual, and
transgender people from religious and political oppression through the
practice of relentless nonviolent resistance.

To read past Soulforce email alerts go to www.soulforce.org/email.

If you received this email from a friend, you can sign up for the
Soulforce email list by going to www.soulforce.org/subscribe.

To donate to the ongoing work of Soulforce please go to
www.soulforce.org/donate.

Soulforce, Inc., P.O. Box 3195, Lynchburg, VA 24503

Radical Deaf Culture

From today's Boston Globe:

Radicalism in the Deaf culture
By Cathy Young | November 6, 2006

SINCE LAST MAY, Gallaudet University, the world's only university designed entirely for deaf and hard-of-hearing students, has been rocked by protests over the selection of a new president.

Jane K. Fernandes was scheduled to take over from I. King Jordan in January. On Oct. 29, after protesters shut down the Washington campus for more than two weeks, the board of trustees revoked Fernandes's appointment. This fiasco is a striking example of identity politics gone mad.

In 1988, protesters rebelled against the appointment of a hearing president, Elisabeth Singer [sic...her name is Dr. Elizabeth Zinser, now president of Southern Oregon University], and demanded a deaf president (something Gallaudet had never had since its founding in 1864). Singer [sic] resigned , and Jordan was appointed in her place.

Fernandes, the Gallaudet provost whom Jordan wanted to see as his replacement, is also deaf; but to some, "not deaf enough." She grew up lip-reading and speaking and learned sign language only as a graduate student.

In recent weeks, anti-Fernandes students and professors have denied that their objections had anything to do with her not being deaf enough, and have accused her of raising the issue to pose as a victim of political correctness.

However, the Washington Post reports that the protesters backed off the "not deaf enough" complaint only when they realized that it wasn't likely to garner sympathy from the outside world. They focused instead on Fernandes's supposedly autocratic and intimidating leadership style and her alleged lack of interpersonal skills (one critic quoted by the Inside Higher Ed website even noted that she didn't smile enough).

There were also vague charges that she is insufficiently committed to fighting racism. Yet none of these gripes seem sufficient to justify the passion that led to her ouster: the protests included hunger strikes and threats of violence.

Some of the criticisms publicly leveled at Fernandes are overtly rooted in identity politics.

In a letter to the Post , Gallaudet English professor Kathleen M. Wood excoriated both Fernandes and Jordan for taking the position that Gallaudet is for all deaf students. This misguided inclusiveness, Wood asserted , had attracted deaf students who were "not integrating into Deaf culture" and resisting the use of sign language. She ended her letter by stating, "The new Gallaudet will not be for everyone."

"Deaf culture" -- that's Deaf with a capital D -- has flourished at Gallaudet. It is a radical movement that views deafness not as a disability but as an oppressed minority status akin to race, and also as a unique linguistic culture. The movement holds that there is nothing wrong with being deaf, only with how society has treated deaf people.

Few would deny that, historically, deaf people and others with disabilities have endured stereotyping, bias, and unfairness. Much progress has been made toward seeing people with disabilities as whole individuals, toward focusing on what they can do, not on what they can't . But it's a leap from this understanding to the bizarre idea that the lack of hearing is no more a disability than being female or black. (Verbal communication aside, surely being unable to hear environmental sounds often places a person at a serious disadvantage.)

The majority of deaf people do not belong to Deaf culture. It is estimated that at most a quarter of profoundly deaf people in the United States use sign language. Yet at many schools for the deaf, signing has been dogmatically treated as the only acceptable communication; children with some hearing have received little training in auditory and speaking skills. Deaf schools that promote "oralism" have been targeted for protests.

More harmful still, Deaf activists have railed against cochlear implants, which enable many deaf children to gain functional hearing; some deaf parents have denied implants to their children on ideological grounds. The activists also oppose research into cures for deafness through gene therapy and other means.

To them, attempts to "fix" deafness amounts to nothing short of genocide.

Fernandes herself embraces Deaf culture, but she does not want it to be isolated from the hearing world or exclude those who don't meet purist standards of "Deafness." She also believes that the deaf community must deal honestly with the challenges posed by advances in medicine.

When this sensible view is rejected under pressure from a handful of radicals, it is a testament to the madness that can prevail when oppressed-minority status becomes a weapon to silence critics.

Cathy Young is a contributing editor at Reason magazine. Her column appears regularly in the Globe.



© Copyright 2006 The New York Times Company

Op Ed in Rochester Democrat and Chronicle 11/3/06

http://www.democratandchronicle.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20061103/OPINION02/611030381/1039/OPINION

Gallaudet is isolating its deaf students

By Jack Slutzky


(November 3, 2006)--I am totally dismayed and more than a little angry over the events at Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C. The trustees voted late last month to terminate the appointment of incoming president Jane Fernandes, the subject of months of protests.

These feelings have been aroused in me by phrases being bandied around: "not deaf enough," "not my kind of deaf," "deaf culture," "not adequately committed to American Sign Language" and "Gallaudet, the leading college for the deaf."

I taught at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf at Rochester Institute of Technology for more than 27 years. My son, who was born profoundly deaf, is an assistant professor at an upstate university teaching hearing students.

I have worked with and for people across the country who are deaf or hard of hearing for more than 40 years. I mention these facts to give credibility to my words.

Gallaudet University is not the leading university for the deaf. It might be the oldest, but it is far from the best. Judging by the success of Gallaudet students in the classroom and workplace, Gallaudet is not even a close second to NTID.

To say that Fernandes is "not deaf enough" or doesn't "use the right kind of communication" is as insulting as it is bigoted. I worked at NTID with a dedicated faculty and staff, deaf and hearing, to enable students who are deaf to reach their potential and become full-fledged members of society. And they have! To have shut themselves in a small enclave a few radicals call "deaf culture" would have insulted the vast numbers of people who are deaf, people who are as heterogeneous as any
group in this country.

The dictionary defines culture as the development of intellectual and moral abilities; enlightenment acquired by the study of the fine arts, humanities and the sciences; and the integrated pattern of human knowledge, belief and behavior that depends on the capacity for learning and transmitting knowledge to succeeding generations. Ergo, "deaf culture" is a misnomer!

American Sign Language does not make a culture. When Fernandes spoke in January of expanding Gallaudet to embrace all forms of deafness, and all modes of communication deaf people use to communicate, she ruffled the feathers of a few defensive hermits afraid of sharing, of growing, of becoming.

Most Americans who are deaf or hearing impaired do not embrace American Sign Language as their language of choice. Most parents of deaf children do not embrace ASL as their language of choice. Most employers and educators of deaf people do not embrace ASL as their language of choice.

I have told my son and hundreds of students I have worked with: I care not how you communicate, but that you communicate. I care not what you choose to study, but that you can and do choose. I care not what you choose to do with your life, but that you have choice in life. Embracing a biased, bigoted misnomer called "deaf culture" and an absolute adherence to ASL will only inhibit your participation in society.

Shame on you, Gallaudet trustees, for caving in to threat and for failing to defend the rights of people across this country who are deaf.

Slutzky, of Le Roy, has been a writer since he retired from RIT 10 years ago. E-mail him at jsocsai@gmail.com.

Happy Halloween Birthday, Jay!

Here is a self-portrait of my son-in-law Jay in a typical pose. There are several photos like this around here (though I could not find the others). Most of them feature spoons. This is the only one with HOOKS.

Anyway, happy birthday to a great husband (to my daughter Sally), father (of Joe, Sam, and Annie), writer, editor, and son-in-law. He has great taste in cars, too.

You're right, Peggy....he doesn't look much different now from when we all lived in Iowa. I think it's the hair....