Is this Thing On? Maryann Barth provides truths about Aids and Implants, how to Speak with the Deaf.

In our classrooms, there is a hidden problem between instructors and certain incoming students. There is a growing number of people who do not know when a lecture is going on, or when homework is being given out, or simply when they are supposed to read a chapter in a book. The reason for this communication problem is because they are Deaf, and so they cannot hear their instructor or their classmates speak.
What might be the solution for such a problem? According to Maryann Barth of St. Rita’s, many have been proposed, but few have actually been proven to help such students. For instance, it is incorrect to assume that the student can read lips: even if this is true in some cases, they still wouldn’t be able to tell the necessary differences. Between the words ‘pad’ and ‘bad’, both unfortunately would look the same.
Another proven fallacy has been the use of cochlear implants and hearing aids. These do not help a Deaf person hear better, but instead can amplify every sound within a room, including the distortion of these. They can also put every sound on the same level, so that an air conditioning system could drown out the voice of a friend or instructor.
For this topic, another representative of St. Rita’s put it best-“Imagine the sounds of tapping pencils, people’s voices, the heating system, moving desks and chairs, and paper being ripped all on the same level of your hearing.” When paired with the surgery method of cochlear implanting-placing part of the implant into a child’s skull-suddenly, that idea of helping one’s son or daughter to ‘hear’ better does not seem so effective.
In some ways, the same might be said for having two translators and a CART system for the student. On one hand, it is very expensive to manage, sometimes costing around three hundred dollars a day. The student might also not be able to take notes from lectures and/or chapters, because they would always be watching their translators tell them what everyone else is saying. So just what would be the proper answer?
This was not clearly given to me during the workshop, but I was still able to figure it out myself. It would not involve translators or strange means of implantation, but hopefully it would work better than both of these. What if instructors who taught Deaf students learned Sign Language? No one would have to pay large amounts of money, and neither would they worry about not hearing anyone.
And on top of this, there would perhaps be much less confusion involved on the parts of both teacher and student. Sure, there would be small differences of words between schools, but perhaps the student would understand the general message that their instructor was giving to them. There might also be just one translator in case the instructor needed help. If these ways were put to use, then perhaps the communication barrier would finally be broken.