Principal on Taylor Swift

The man who leads the school in the middle of the Taylor Swift controversy says he hopes his school wins the contest. As we reported in an earlier post, there is an internet contest underway where the high school that gets the most votes will get a Taylor Swift concert. As a prank, someone got folks voting for the Horace Mann School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, located in Massachusetts. Principal Jeremiah Ford tells the Boston Globe:

“I could be upset about that, I could get stuck in that anger, but that’s not where we should be in this world. My thing is, we understand what your intent was — shame on you — because you have not been educated. But now we will educate you."

He says many of the students at the school are fans of singers like Lady Gaga and if his school wins the $10,000 at stake, “We wouldn’t throw that money away.“It would be about enriching everybody’s life and we would thank those ignorant people for giving us those resources.”

On the Football Field

Matthew Aguila plays football for California's Hesperia High School, located east of Los Angeles. Read about the deaf player here.

KY Woman Attacked by Pit Bull

A deaf woman is in the hospital after a dog attack. On DeafNewsToday.com you can watch a video report from WDRB-TV or read the story here. WDRB 41 Louisville - News, Weather, Sports Community

Regulators: Scam Targeted Deaf Christians

The Feds say a California man took money from deaf Christians by making false promises. Regulators say Marc Perlman promised returns of 5-10% each month for money that he claimed to invest in foreign exchange contracts. Perlman, who himself is deaf, took money from people in California, Florida, Utah, Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Washington, Oregon, and Pennsylvania, and most of it from the deaf community. Nearly $700,000 came from Christians in the deaf community. The Commodity Futures Trading Commission says in a lawsuit filed against Perlman and his iGlobal Strategic Management LLC, based in Rancho Cucamonga, he used most of the money to pay personal expenses.

Pranksters may Bring Taylor Swift to Deaf School

Taylor Swift may end up singing at the Massachusetts School for the Deaf. Apparently, somebody thought it would be funny to get her to sing at a deaf school. So, the jokesters are ballot stuffing to try to make it happen. The Internet contest pits schools against one another. The school with the highest online vote total gets a performance from the 22-year-old country singer. Right now, Massachusetts’ Horace Mann School for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing is in the lead. The official rules, however, allow Swift to opt out, if she wants to do so. The music departments of the five schools that finish with the most votes will get $10,000 grants.

Deaf, Black Students: We Were Manhandled By Police

Summer vacation took a wrong turn for a group from a Trenton trade school in Belleville, New Jersey Tuesday. Watch a video report from WPIX-TV or you can read the story here.

Captioning Calls Major Leaguer "Hitler"

Here's a screen shot of a captioning error that was made during the major league baseball game between the Los Angeles Angels and the Tampa Bay Rays that was broadcast over Sun Sports this past Monday.

What the new Closed Captioning rules REALLY mean

There is a great deal of misinformation going around about the new requirements for captioning online video in the U.S. based on the Communications and Video Accessibility Act (CVAA). Here are a few points of clarification.

• The CVAA requires programming that is first shown on television with captions, it must also be closed captioned online. There is no requirement to caption a program that is shown originally and only online.  
• The root question is whether there was a requirement to close-caption the programming in the first place. If the channel in question generates more than $3 million in annual revenue, captioning is required. If the channel does not make more than $3 million a year, then it is exempt from closed-captioning. 
• CVAA does not apply to newspaper and magazine online sites because the material is not first broadcast and then shoveled online.

Terps at the Fair

WSYR-TV reports on the work of interpreters at New York State fair in this video report, posted on DeafNewsToday.com. Or read the story here.

Filipino Sign Language

An update on the effort to get Filipino Sign Language recognized in the Philippines here.

Challenging what happened after arrest for rape

A deaf South Dakota man remains in jail after prosecutors say he waived his Miranda rights back in February - when he was arrested for first-degree rape of a child. Jesse Johnson's attorney told a judge yesterday that Johnson did not understand his rights at the time. The attorney wants statements Johnson made to police through an interpreter not allowed in court during the coming trial. The attorney also asked for suppression of notes that Johnson wrote - and he's challenging the qualifications of the interpreter used by the state’s attorney’s office after Johnson's arrest. A hearing on the motion is set for September 28th. The 33-year-old could get live in prison, if convicted.

Why a man is driving a lawn mower from Canada to Iowa

Bob Harms hopes to roll into Iowa this morning. His nearly 500 mile journey on his lawn mower at 7 mph is an effort to raise money for the Minnesota Lions Children's Hearing Center at the University of Minnesota Amplatz Children's Hospital. Harms had hearing loss as a child himself. Read more here.

Day School Deaf controversy

What a parent found in the dumpster outside a day school has stirred a dispute in Detroit. WXYZ-TV has a video report posted on DeafNewsToday.com.

Compromised Student Info

Personal information about students could have been stolen from the Utah Schools for the Deaf and the Blind. Read the story here.

Iowa Meeting on School's Future

A hearing will be held this afternoon about the future of Iowa’s schools for blind and deaf students. Join the discussion at Lied Multipurpose Complex on the Council Bluffs campus at 5pm. The Iowa Educational Services for the Blind and Visually Impaired and the Iowa School for the Deaf is considering consolidating services now provided at the Iowa School for the Deaf in Council Bluffs and the Iowa Braille and Sight Saving School in Vinton.

Hearing Device Stolen

Someone broke into a woman's car and stole part of her son's implant. A video report is posted on DeafNewsToday.com from Oregon's KTVZ-TV.

Deaf filmmaker can't stop listening

The Associated Press writes about what popping on new hearing aids did for Austin Chapman here.

Texting Limits

New texting rules in India hurts the deaf. Read the story in the Wall Street Journal here.

Power Struggle over Day School

Read about the battle over closure of the Detroit Day School for the Deaf here.

Improved Living at Gallaudet

WRC-TV in Washington, DC takes a look at how the new Gallaudet dorms are helping incoming students in an article posted here.