A message for ASL and Deaf Studies teachers that assign students to go find and
interview Deaf people:
Stop being lazy and putting the burden on your students to "locate" Deaf people
to interview.
YOU locate the Deaf people and Deaf Educators to be interviewed since YOU are
the one getting paid to teach the class.
If you feel you "must" have your students interview Deaf people then also
consider how YOU can reimburse the interviewee for their time and effort helping
YOU teach your class (the class for which you are being paid)!
Here's a tip: Johannes Gutenberg invented this thing called the printing press.
It allowed for these wonderful things called books. Then later on Deaf authors
wrote books. In your syllabus you can assign a book written by a Deaf author and
then have your students PAY for that book to read the opinions and information
of the Deaf author. Or if you and your students are too cheap to do that
-- then assign Deaf blogs and/or vlogs which are plentiful online for free!
Using your students as unpaid research assistants and/or using the Deaf
community as unpaid teaching assistants is a cheap and lazy way to teach.
If you are an ASL instructor then YOU go find a Deaf person and invite them to
class and pay for their parking permit. Afterward take the guest presenter
out to a nice dinner and/or hand them a gift card at least equal to the value
you get paid per hour to teach (most of you college instructors earn around $60
or more per classroom contact hour).
Spread the wealth -- don't be stingy with your money when you are asking Deaf
interviewees to be generous with their time, hard-earned wisdom, and life
experience.
Notes:
Also see:
Interview a Deaf Person
Notes: