Professor Wisdom Kwadwo Mprah, a Senior Lecturer at the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology (KNUST), has put forward a convincing argument for a national policy as well as education reforms that can help to eliminate the barriers to communication that continue to hamper the education of deaf students in Ghana.
He claimed that the absence of a uniform policy for using sign language, both in schools that are mainstream and those for deaf children has thrown learning and teaching into chaos with teachers adopting a range of methods they believed to be appropriate.
Dr Mprah noted that although the majority of mainstream schools are not accessible to students who are deaf due to language barriers over 90% of teachers from the 16 elementary schools and the Senior High School (SHS) for deaf students were unable to communicate using sign language.
According to Dr Mprah who is head of the Department of Health Promotion and Disabilities within the School of Public Health, teachers of students who are deaf learn sign language through their peers and describe it as a terrible arrangement.
The issue was made worse by the absence of assistive devices like hearing aids in the majority of schools and as a result, only a small percentage of deaf students could move beyond the SHS level.
“Those that are in the tertiary institutions are also affected. In addition to being at the Presbyterian College of Education at Akropong in the Eastern Region, and I believe, Takoradi Technical University, which has permanent interpreters however, other institutions don’t have interpreters.
“Winneba For instance, “Winneba” has a lot of deaf students, but frequently employs other students to provide interpretation for students with deafness. Therefore, some deaf students are not able to access interpreter services. The ones who do, aren’t able to find qualified interpreters.” the Dr. revealed.
“The main thing that can break the communication barrier is using sign language interpreters, and or teachers who can sign fluently but none of this is adequately available,” he complained.
Dr Mprah, therefore, advised teacher training institutes to give teachers the right training in deaf schools.
“This training should cover areas such as the use of sign language, attitude towards deaf children, how to teach deaf children [a course on deaf education], among others,” He explained.
The minister also demanded an overhaul of the curriculum currently in place to accommodate the requirements of students who are deaf.
He stated that institutions of education, in particular, those that deal with students with deafness need to be adequately staffed to ensure inclusive education.
He also urged parents to take active attention to how they educate their children with deafness and to treat them with the same respect as their hearing peers.
“They must be able to communicate with deaf children. This is extremely important, however, it is difficult to achieve and it requires lots of effort,” he added.