I have worked in the deaf community for over 32 years. Most of my experiences have been wonderful. Unfortunately, some are tragic. In particular, deaf people have trusted me with stories of how they were sexually abused as children. In most cases, they have never shared their experiences with anyone else.
I thought of this again last Monday, March 1st. DR. HAROLD A. JOHNSON, teaches at Michigan State University. He has been involved with deaf education for decades. He had come to Chicago to give a talk at the EDHI Conference. His talk was on CHILD ABUSE & NEGLECT: What Teachers of Deaf Children Should Know. However, before he gave the talk, he had sent his outline to me and several others. He asked us to meet with him to give him feedback on his presentation.
Dr. Christine Pawelski from New York, Dr. Meg Creedon from Chicago(an expert on Autism), and I met with Dr. Johnson. The facts are very clear:
In the USA, 9% of children without disabilities and 31% of children with disabilities(including deaf) suffer Child Abuse and Neglect(CA/N)
CA/N damages children in ways that they never can fully recover.
Many teachers and school administrators, ESPECIALLY IN SPECIAL EDUCATION SETTINGS,
a) Do not understand the requirments of Mandated Reporting;
b) Do not fully cooperate with law enforcement citing confidentiality issues with the IEPs;
c) Do not know a great deal about the signs of CA/N;
d) Often miss or misinterpret behavioral clues re CA/N; worse, may often try to change or eliminate the very behaviors that are "red flags" that something is wrong in the child's life;
e) Often do not believe that someone will want to sexually abuse a child with a disability.
I spent some time at the meeting explaining to Dr. Johnson that "nice" people think that sexual predators are just like them. They are not.Many teachers think of sexual abuse in terms of physical attractiveness. Sexual predators are not attarCTed by beauty but by vulnerability. Those who sexually abuse children with disabilities or the children of parents who are deaf and/or disabled, know exactly what they are doing. I have interviewed both deaf and hearing sexual abusers. Sex, children, hurt, boundaries, rights, consequences-they think about these differently than you or me.
Dr. Johnson is trying to get all the major Special Education organizations and teachers' groups to work together on this issue. We all hope he succeeds. Here are a couple of websites that are helpful:
1 The following is a website that trains professionals about sexual abuse and children with disabilities:
http://childabuse.tc.columbia.edu/cred.jsp
2 The following is Dr. Johnson's site: http://deafed-childabuse-neglect-col.wiki.educ.msu.edu/
This is an issue we all must continue to address.