‘I feel that government doesn’t really understand our needs’

Pacquet native Chad Greenham lives in a silent world.

The 29-year-old overcame obstacles that most people would surrender to.

Some of those barriers included feeling isolated from other students because he couldn’t understand what they were saying, and being in a classroom and not being able to understand what was being taught.

The reason Mr. Greenham couldn’t understand or hear is because he’s deaf. But that hasn’t prevented him from becoming successful.

And because of all the success, Mr. Greenham isn’t pleased the provincial government closed the Newfoundland School for the Deaf – the educational institution he said provided him with the skills needed to succeed in life.

“If I hadn’t gone to the school, I probably wouldn’t have known about all the opportunities that are out in the world,” he said through an interpreter.

From five years old until graduating high school, Mr. Greenham called NSD home, except for a small stint outside of the specialized educational system.

Because of his time at the school and learning about the vast pool of resources for deaf people, Mr. Greenham moved on in life, went to post-secondary school in the United States and has become a civil engineer for a company in Nova Scotia.

All that was made possible said Mr. Greenham, because of the opportunities NSD provided and being in an environment “(where) we were all on an equal level with other deaf people.”

Mr. Greenham said if deaf students don’t attend specialized educational institutions, they are lost and are not given the same quality of education as students who are not deaf.

“I was very frustrated with not really understanding the teacher when they would move their lips, I didn’t understand a lot that was being said,” recalls Mr. Greenham from his time in a mainstream school.

“I feel that government doesn’t really understand our needs and does not understand the service and stimulations we need to continue in today’s society.”

NSD was established in 1964 as a place where students from across the province could live and study. Last year there were only 12 students compared 54 when the school first opened. It’s anticipated that government will save $1.2 million annually from the closure.

When the Minister of Education Darin King announced the closure in early August, he said the rise in cochlear implants to assist deaf people, as well as a changing philosophy in teaching methods, is resulting in higher numbers of deaf and hard of hearing students attending public schools. 

"In some cases they go from a setting where there was maybe a second student their age in the school for the deaf," Mr. King told Transcontinental Media "Now they're in a class of 25 or 26 and they're engaged in so many activities that help them develop socially and emotionally."

But being in a mainstream classroom doesn’t bring back the best memories for Mr. Greenham. That’s why he’s adamant government shouldn’t have closed the school.

“As a kid, all these other kids were laughing and I didn’t know what they were laughing about,” he recalls. “I was very frustrated.”