Girls Hearing Loss Up

Hearing loss from blaring club music is up among adolescent girls over the last decade. A new study finds it is nearly the same as that for adolescent boys for the first time. Teens are exposed to enough loud noises that their long-term hearing may be in jeopardy. Details are in the online edition of the journal Pediatrics . The increased headphone-use did not appear to be the cause of the increase in hearing loss among teen girls. Instead, the study authors point to the extremely loud music often found in club or music concert settings.

Online Torah Class for Deaf

A website that helps students to learn Torah in real-time, interactive classrooms will begin offering classes that will accommodate the deaf next month. Web YeshivaThe first class, Jewish Laws of Shabbat: Cooking, will be taught by Rabbi Gabe Pransky. An interpreter will be viewable in a video box.

Shot During Robbery

A deaf Ohio man is in critical condition after he was robbed and then shot by a gang at a bus stop. Police say Sherman Robinson of Dayton was attacked by 4 men who shot him in the back, even though he turned over his valuables to them.

Silent Warriors Roll

The Alabama School for the Deaf are undefeated in boys basketball, so far this season. The 13-0 Class 1A Silent Warriors also won the Don Hackney Classic tournament recently by beating the Mississippi School for the Deaf, the Georgia School for the Deaf and the Atlanta Area School for the Deaf. Their next game is a week from today (January 6th) against Fayetteville.

Before They Can Talk

Classes teaching BSL are being offered in the UK. The Chronicle tells the story here.

Suit Against Bus Service

A deaf-blind bus rider is suing the Columbus, Ohio bus service. WCMH-TV explains why in the video below. You can read the story here.

Skateboarding Brothers

WHAS-TV in Louisville, Kentucky reports on a pair of deaf brothers who are making a splash in the skateboarding scene.

Lim's Art Making an Impact

A deaf Malaysian artist is receiving praise for the his work on TIME magazine's year-end cover picture. Leon Lim, who works out of New York, created the image of WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange using the text of a leaked cable. He was third runner-up in the editors' list of newsmakers but was the Readers' Choice in a poll conducted by TIME. Deaf since birth, Lim is in the U.S. on an art scholarship.

Hospital Refuses to Provide Terps

A Miami hospital claims it doesn't have to provide interpreters to deaf patients because it is not a public establishment. Maura Mena made a discrimination complaint against Palmetto General Hospital because. The Florida Human Relations Commission sided with the hospital, saying hospitals aren't covered as public accommodations under the Civil Rights Act. Now the case is before the 1st District Court of Appeal in Tallahassee which has asked the Human Relations Commission to decide whether the hospital cafeteria qualifies the entire facility as a public establishment.

Preservation

A film about sign language is taking it's place among a select group of 25 to be preserved by The Library of Congress as part of the National Film Registry. Among the 25 films are The Exorcist, Airplane and a two minute film from 1913 called Preservation. It features George Veditz, president of the National Association of the Deaf (NAD) demonstrating in sign language the importance of defending the right of deaf people to sign as opposed to verbalizing their communication. This was one of the first motion-picture recordings of American Sign Language. Veditz made this film specifically to record sign language for posterity at a time when oralists were making inroads in the education of the deaf. You can see the film here.

The Library of Congress selects just 25 films each year for preservation because nearly half of the films made before 1950 and some 90% of those made before 1920 have been lost.

1st Implant

Uganda has its 1st cochlear implant recipient. The story of 4-year-old Elaine Mukaaya is told by Boston's WCVB-TV here.

Ohio Church Break-in

Someone broke into the Agape Deaf Church in Dayton and stole $4 over the weekend out of a change container.

Two Children Die in Fire

Two deaf children died in Arizona over the weekend in a mobile home fire. Seven-year-old Justin Stevens and 11-year-old Zachary Stevens died in an accidental fire in Fort Mohave that injured five other memebers of their family - the parents and three other children. Jeff Stevens, the father, is the most seriously injured, after trying to rescue the boys that he lost. A fundraiser is planned to help the unemployed couple.

Deaf and Jewish

An estimated 50,000 deaf Jews live in the US, according to advocacy groups for the Jewish deaf. There are only a handful of synagogues for the deaf and half a dozen deaf rabbis.

Memories Betrayed

The former head of the Texas School for the Deaf now faces Alzheimer's disease. The Austin Statesman profiles him here.

Fired for ASL Gestures

An ASL teacher is out work this Christmas because a student complained about her gestures. Jaye Brown has taught for more than a dozen years at Shasta College in Redding, California, but she was let go because she used gestures, common in Deaf Culture, to describe people and body parts. Students have set up a support page for her here and a petition has been started here. So far, the administrators have been unwilling to reconsider the decision. You can call their office at (530) 242-7524 to express your opinion.

Diving Trips for the Deaf

There are few companies that offer diving trips for the deaf and hard of hearing. Siren, Worldwide Dive and Sail is one of them. The company has been doing one major trip in Southeast Asia for the deaf each a year since 2004. They've taken divers to spots like Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines. The next trip is scheduled for September in the Maldives, some 500 miles off the southern tip of India. Founder Frank van der Linde first decided to expand his business to the deaf community after working with a deaf British dive instructor. Hearing guests are encouraged to learn at least the basics of the sign-language alphabet to be able to communicate with the deaf patrons. The trips are focused on guests who use either ASL or BSL (British Sign Language). Deaf or hard of hearing customers get a 20-25% discount on trips. Find out more here.

Bill Would Force ASL Acceptance

A Virginia state legislator is proposing a law that would require state colleges to accept ASL as a foreign language fulfillment for incoming students. Virginia High Schoolers are already allowed to use ASL as a graduation requirement, under a 1998 provision from the Virginia Department of Education. House Bill 1435, proposed by Dickie Bell, would make colleges accept it as well, whenever a foreign language is required for admission. The University of Virginia already accepts ASL and maintains an ASL program. However, it's a different story at James Madison University’s language department, where several proposals to recognize ASL as a foreign language have been rejected.

Sale of Deaf School Goes Through

Michigan's governor has signed a bill, allowing the sale of the state school for the deaf in Flint. A developer is buying the campus, plans to renovate it and make it the new home of the Michigan School for the Deaf and a new school - the Powers Catholic High School. Some families of deaf students had sought to block the sale. Here's a video report on it from WJRT-TV.

Noises Off

A Gallaudet play has been selected to compete for Kennedy Center honors. The fall production of Noises Off made such an impression on the judges in attendance, they want it to be part of the the Kennedy Center American College Theatre Festival. Students will perform in the Region 2 competition taking place at Towson University on January 15th. If they win, the student directed play wins, it will have a spot in an April showcase among the nation's best at the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC. The production Goya: en la Quinta del Sordo (in the house of the deaf man) rose to the national round in 2008.