Saluting a group that helped make life better for the deaf community

Thank you for allowing me to write this account of an organization that made a difference.

Formed in 1980 by Charles Harkins, the former principal of the Newfoundland School for the Deaf, and Laurence Cashin, president of the Parents Association of Hearing Impaired Children, the Newfoundland Co-ordinating Council on Deafness (NCCD) was conceived as an association that would bring together all the groups trying to enhance the lives of deaf and hard of hearing Newfoundlanders.

Originally, NCCD consisted of a representative from the following organizations: the St. John’s Association of the Deaf, the St. John’s Hard of Hearing Association, the Newfoundland Council of Educators of the Deaf and the Department of Social Services. The plan was to be a united front in lobbying the government for appropriate services for this unique community.

In 1981, NCCD hired one of the most skilled American Sign Language (ASL) interpreters in Canada to train interested Newfoundlanders to become interpreters themselves. David Still used immersion in ASL to teach eight people the profession. After a full year of training, NCCD brought a panel from the Registry of Interpreters of the Deaf (RID) from the United States to evaluate those eight people as well as a few teachers who had been interpreting for the community for a decade. Although some of the teachers were certified at their own expense, of those who entered the interpreting program, only three had developed the skills to become certified by the RID. NCCD hired those three and one other person who was determined by a group of deaf individuals to be worthy of a job in this profession.

From 1982 until 1993, interpreters from NCCD travelled throughout the province providing ASL interpreting for any deaf person for any reason at any time, free of charge to the individual. The appropriate government agency would be charged a fee for the service. The money collected from interpreting allowed NCCD to grow and hire an office manager, a counsellor who provided employment counselling and résumé writing to those deaf and hard of hearing adults looking for a job; that individual also recruited potential employers and advised them to hire deaf employees.

In 1983, the president of the St. John’s Hard of Hearing Association left NCCD and formed the Canadian Hard of Hearing Association — Newfoundland Chapter (CHHA-NL). Soon after, the St. John’s Association of the Deaf officially became the Newfoundland and Labrador Association of the Deaf (NLAD).

Due to governmental changes, NCCD was forced to discontinue providing interpreter services as originally established; however, we were able to offer specialized interpreting in schools such as the Carpenters/millwright College and the College of the North Atlantic.

With many changes in services for the deaf and hard of hearing population, NCCD faced a number of challenges with service provision. Since 1983, NCCD offered support services to people with hearing loss who entered post-secondary training. This included vocational counselling services, assistance in gaining access to post-secondary education/transitional support, orientation and in servicing of faculty and/or instructional personnel, personalized assistive listening devices and accessories, arranging and monitoring tutorial and note-taking services.

In 2009, we fought the closure of the Newfoundland School for the Deaf and most recently lobbied for a feasibility study to re-open the school. We presented a submission to the engagement process for accessibility legislation on Feb. 20, 2019. The NCCD also supports the

Deaf Children Matters project to persuade the Department of Education to provide continuing and appropriate educational services to those children whose first language is ASL.

So, it is with great sadness that after 41 years of providing a variety of services to the Newfoundland and Labrador deaf and hard of hearing community, we announce the permanent closure of the council. As the last support we can share, we will provide the audiologist working with the Newfoundland and Labrador Eastern School District with any information she needs.

We hope that NLAD and CHHA-NL will take over providing support for deaf and hard of hearing students attending post-secondary institutions, both at home and out of province.