Locals raising funds for full immersion trip into deaf culture and community
by Trinity Gruenberg
trinity@inhnews.com
Kyara Topp of Verndale and Danielle Peltier of Bertha are working to raise funds to go on a once-in-a-lifetime trip with their college class for a fully immersive experience.
Topp and Peltier are two of eight American Sign Language (ASL) students, in a two-year program through Central Lakes College in Brainerd.
This March, they hope to take a class trip to Gallaudet University in Washington D.C. The university is a private, federally-chartered research university for the education of the deaf and hard of hearing. It was founded in 1864 as a grammar school for both deaf and blind children.
The mission to start a school for the deaf began in 1816 when Laurent Clerc and Thomas Hopkins Gallaudet crossed the Atlantic from Paris, France, to the United States with a dream to open the country’s first school for deaf education.
During Gallaudet’s first stop in England, schools were taught strictly by oralism.
“A deaf person misses 70-80% of what you are saying just by reading your lips,” explained Topp.
Gallaudet went to a French University where Clerc taught French sign language. Gallaudet taught Clerc English, and Clerc created ASL . . .