Blue Mountain High School senior Rebecca Downey has studied Spanish and French and is now working on her own to learn a third language - one she believes will help her on her career path.
"I want to work in the public health field. That's one of the reasons I'm learning sign language," Downey, 17, of Schuylkill Haven, said.
Johnathan Orozco, a fifth-grader at Blue Mountain Elementary Cressona, said he decided to start learning sign language when he saw a woman who was hard of hearing and having trouble finding her luggage at an airport in 2008.
"That made me feel sad. I know English and Spanish and this would be my third language. I could see myself using it in airports, stores, restaurants, almost anywhere," Orozco, 11, of Schuylkill Haven.
Downey and Orozco don't have problems with their hearing or speech. They developed an interest in American Sign Language because they found it fascinating.
Nicole McCormick, Middleport, praised such students. Her daughter, Lexi Corby, 7, is learning sign language because she has a physical problem that strains her speech.
"One of my worries, especially before she could write, was that if there was an emergency or if Lexi got lost and I wasn't there to verbally translate, who would understand her?" McCormick said. "Other people learning sign gives my child and other signing children a bigger world to play in with more people who understand them."
"According to our best estimates from information gathered by such sources as the Gallaudet Research Institute in the early 2000s, there are between 200,000 and 500,000 Americans who use American Sign Language as their primary language," Kristen Harmon, a professor of English at Gallaudet University, Washington D.C., said.
Gallaudet is the world's only university for the deaf and hard of hearing.
"The field of sign language interpreting is growing. A visual language is an appealing alternative for those who struggle with or want alternatives to learning a spoken language for their high school or university requirements," Harmon said. "Some know deaf people. Some have found that visual language and finger spelling is an effective way to engage hearing people who struggle with spoken communication, eye gaze or social communication. Some are drawn to the visual nature of the language and of the visual technology that comes along with documenting and sharing the language.
"I've heard that workers in some fields that require working in silenced situations learn some limited signs for communication, like scuba divers who work on ship repair underwater and so forth," Harmon said.
Shannon Brennan, director of McCann School of Business & Technology's Pottsville campus, said she hasn't had any experiences with students using sign language at the campus since she started working at McCann in 1999.
"However, I think knowing or learning sign language can be helpful in some career fields. I think it can be very advantageous for early education specialists," she said. "My sister-in-law has a degree in social work and she utilized sign language with my nephew when he was very young for simple things like 'more' or 'hungry.' It can be a very effective way to prevent the frustration that is common in toddlers who can't yet verbalize what they want.
"I could see it being very helpful for preschool teachers. I would think for anyone majoring in social work or human services, it could be an added benefit when working in the field, because you just never know what types of ability levels you will encounter," Brennan said.
In schools
In Schuylkill County, public school students with hearing or speech problems can learn to sign through Schuylkill Intermediate Unit 29, Mar Lin. The IU 29 started such programs about 1978, Diane M. Niederriter, IU 29 executive director, said.
For the past three years, the IU has had a classroom for such students in grades kindergarten through eighth at Saint Clair Area Elementary/Middle School, Debra Arnold, IU 29 director of special education, said.
"It's the only one in the county at present," she said. "We have two full-time teachers, one full-time aide and two part-time aides. We don't have one on the secondary level. That classroom closed several years back."
Including Lexi, there are 11 students taking classes there now: two from Saint Clair Area and one each from Blue Mountain, Mahanoy Area, Minersville Area, North Schuylkill, Pine Grove Area, Pottsville Area, Shenandoah Valley, Tamaqua Area and Tri-Valley.
On Jan. 8, for example, Sharon Morin, an instructional aide, used sign language to teach vocabulary to two students, Fernando Ramirez, 6, of Minersville, and Naomi Warfel, 6, of Blue Mountain.
In Pennsylvania, public secondary schools must offer two foreign languages, one of which must include a four-year sequence. School districts can elect to teach American Sign Language, Saint Clair Area Superintendent Kendy K. Hinkel said. However, she didn't know of any school districts in Schuylkill County that do.
For the past four years, students at Nativity BVM High School have had the opportunity to take American Sign Language as an elective through an online educational system, Jennifer Daubert, Nativity's director of development, said Friday.
"Nativity doesn't offer sign language in the school. But through the Virtual High School collaborative, an online learning system, our students would be able to take a course in sign language. It would be a semester course," Daubert said.
No students at Nativity have chosen that elective so far, Daubert said.
Other teachers
Downey and Orozco take sign language classes from Joanne Forbes, 63, who teaches out of her Reedsville home.
Forbes started taking American Sign Language classes in 1989 when she learned there was a possibility her husband, Mike, may lose his hearing. He suffered Meniere's disease, an inner ear disorder.
"I wanted to be able to communicate with him in case he lost his hearing," she said.
For the past few years, Forbes has been a sign language teacher for Diakon Lutheran Social Ministries, Schuylkill Haven.
"I can teach people the vocabulary of the language and emphasize the importance of facial expressions. But it takes either a deaf friend or deaf teacher to truly teach them the language," Forbes said.
As a child, Downey became aware of sign language by watching children's television.
"I was fascinated by it," Downey said.
When she was 15, she started taking classes at Berks Deaf & Hard of Hearing Services, Reading. She studied there for a year.
Downey is planning to study public health at American University, Washington D.C.
"I also want to be an EMT," Downey said.
"She wants to be an 'emergency-ologist,' " Forbes said.
"That's one way to put it. I don't know if there's such a word, but I like it," Downey said.
"Say there's a disaster. She would go on the scene and say there's a deaf person there. She'll have the ability with her language skills to communicate with that person," Forbes said.
"Interpreters are needed everywhere you go, in hospitals, in government, on cruise ships even. I really want to be able to use it in the future. And you never know when you'll have to use it," Downey said.
On Easter 2011, Downey was at a restaurant in Berks County. She saw a woman walk in and the hostess tried to seat her. The patron paused and, using sign language, tried to tell the hostess she was waiting for a friend.
"Her spoken language wasn't so great. She was trying to sign and the waitress didn't understand," Downey said. "I could see what she was trying to say. So I went up to the hostess and said 'She's waiting for a friend, who's not here yet.' They were very grateful."