Bradley Speck is looking forward to independence
By Angie Mason
Email: amason@ydr.com
@angiemason1 on Twitter
In some ways, leaving home for college isn’t all that different for Bradley Speck.
Speck, who has been deaf since birth, spent his 13-year school career traveling from his West Manchester Township home to the Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf, a residential school in Pittsburgh.
Every Sunday afternoon, a school van picked him up to catch the bus for a four-hour trip to school. Most weekends, he hopped back on the bus Friday afternoon for the return trip home.
Last week, Speck, now 19, and his family moved his belongings into a dorm room at the National Technical Institute for the Deaf, a college of the Rochester Institute of Technology, in Rochester, N.Y. He plans to pursue a degree in engineering.
“A lot of people would say, ‘I couldn’t send my child away for a whole week,’” Linda Yakacki, Speck’s grandmother, said, of sending him away to school when he was younger. “Where we are now … he’s going off to college. That’s the payoff.”
The education he needed
When he started kindergarten locally, family members said Speck wasn’t getting the educational services he needed. Mom Karin Davies said her son was capable of more than he was doing.
“They said he wasn’t going to read or get past this grade level,” she said. “It was kind of like ‘why not?’”
The family researched other options and received permission from the West York Area School Board for him to attend the Pittsburgh school. They liked the school for its variety of programs and access to activities such as sports.
Davies acknowledged it was hard. But they visited the school and saw how excited students were and the resources that were available. The teachers seemed active with the kids.
“It was completely different than what we were used to,” she said.
Speck said the trips back and forth were tiring. But he liked the school, which he says gave him a lot of opportunities and prepared him well for college.
He amassed a large list of extracurricular activities, playing soccer, basketball and track, and participating in the Academic Bowl, the Junior National Association of the Deaf, and National Honor Society. He went to space camp and took a school trip to London. He was senior class president and class valedictorian.
Gaining more independence
At Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf, Speck liked his math, science and robotics classes, he said by Facebook chat. He decided to pursue a career in engineering and checked out Galludet University and the National Technical Institute for the Deaf before deciding the latter better matched his interests.
Though he’s been away from home before, college will still be different, Speck said. He won’t see his family for longer periods, and he’ll have to be more independent, he said.
At his old school, supervision was constant. Staff checked on students, woke them up for classes. He wasn’t allowed off campus by himself. Now, he’ll be on his own — something he’s looking forward to.
“I always want to be more independent,” he said.
It makes mom a little nervous, though.
“There’s not really anybody up there to watch out for him,” Davies said.
Speck could have classes with deaf students, hard-of-hearing students and hearing students, he said. If professors and other students don’t know sign language, he will communicate through interpreters, email or video phone.
Neighbor Lynne List runs out of her house and wishes Bradley Speck well, giving him some money for college before he left. Speck was valedictorian at Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf in Pittsburgh, where he traveled for his 13-year school career. (Paul Kuehnel — Daily Record/Sunday News)Speck selected his roommate — a deaf student from California — over the summer and chatted with him on Facebook.
On Aug. 11, Speck’s family — mom, stepfather Ashley Davies, sisters Alexis Speck, 16, and Kaelyn Davies, 8, and Yakacki — packed up his clothes and dorm supplies and headed to Rochester.
That night, they purchased some shirts at the campus bookstore, and the next morning, they joined the long line of students checking in. Speck picked up his keys and campus ID, and his family hauled his belongings into his room. He met some friends from his old school and a summer camp he’d attended.
Speck said he’s happy to not have to worry about packing and unpacking each weekend, like he did at his old school. He’s attending a career seminar this week and had to take placement testing before classes start next week.
Davies said she had some tears when it was time to leave him on campus, but he seemed ready to be on his own.
“He seemed pretty comfortable,” she said.
Contact Angie Mason at 771-2048.
Local colleges head back
New students will move in at York College today. There are four days of orientation activities, and classes start 5 p.m. Monday.
Fall classes begin Monday at Penn State York. Students already have returned to HACC’s York campus.
About the National Technical Institute for the Deaf
The National Technical Institute for the Deaf, a college of the Rochester Institute of Technology, was created by Congress in 1965.
About 1,432 students are attending NTID this year from the U.S. and other countries. Of those, 1,256 are deaf or hard-of-hearing, and others are interpreting students or students in the college’s master’s teaching program, according to information provided by the college.
NTID offers associate’s degree programs, which often lead students into bachelor’s programs. Some deaf students start in four-year programs at RIT with primarily hearing students but request services through NTID, said Greg Livadas, spokesman for the school.
The college has more than 130 sign language interpreters, and also provides services such as classroom captioning and note-taking, making it “by far the most accessible college campus” for deaf and hard-of-hearing students, Livadas said.
The NTID Center on Employment focuses on supporting deaf and hard-of-hearing students, according to John Macko, director. A large reason the students are successful is because of cooperative work experiences through the school, he said.
Employment advisers work both with students on their resumes and interview skills and with employers on things like integrating and accommodating deaf employees in the workplace.
Students might have to decide if they are comfortable being a “pioneer” at a company that doesn’t have a history of hiring deaf or hard-of-hearing people, or if they prefer to work somewhere with a solid history of doing so, he said.
Companies like Microsoft and Lockheed Martin come to NTID to recruit and expand their diversity, he said.
Source: ydr.com article