Chapel Hill-Carrboro City Schools will offer American Sign Language (ASL) classes next year, introducing students to ASL, as well as the community norms of the deaf and hard of hearing community.
The new course offering is largely a result of the work of Eliza Miller, a junior at the school.
According to Miller mom’s Anne, Eliza, who uses “she/they” pronouns, has been interested in advocacy since she was young. Miller has done a variety of service work advocating for equity in education, which Ms. Miller believes it gave Eliza a “new perspective” on life. According to Miller’s mom, Eliza’s passion for equity also comes from having dyslexia.
Miller began to take ASL courses online in middle school and continued taking ASL courses throughout high school. Miller really enjoyed the course because it provided a way to learn a language while dealing with their dyslexia. In the past, Miller has struggled learning languages due to their issues with processing the differences in linguistic, conceptual and modulation structures of foreign languages.
However, when Miller decided to take an ASL course towards the end of middle school and the first two years of high school, it made them feel like “a cloud had been lifted.”
After completing ASL levels 1 and 2 Miller quickly discovered the difficulty of learning a language, especially such a physical language, in an online environment.
Miller decided to write a proposal to the CHCCS board to get ASL 1-4 offered in-person because the online classes proved to be inaccessible. Miller said the lack of in-person classes was also “an issue of inclusion and equity in education.”
“I had a lot of help in this effort,” Miller said, mentioning the network of people they worked with in order to make this request. Ryan McGraw, Miller’s counselor, said that this was a “multi-year effort” for Miller: Miller has been interested in creating this program since their freshman year.
One of the many adults who helped Miller was principal Charles Blanchard. Blanchard said he helped Miller to “navigate the new course proposal process for [the] district,” and he also presented the request to the district Curriculum Management Team. Blanchard did credit Miller with writing the proposal which “was excellent!”
In the letter Miller wrote to the CHCCS Board of Education, they focused on four essential points: better communication with the deaf and hard of hearing community; better communication with people who are non-verbal; accessibility for kids with dyslexia; and cross-curricular skill-building opportunities.
While Miller does support the online program, they also noted the many issues with taking ASL online, such as the compacted nature of the course and the lack of intermediate and advanced levels for students.
After many months of waiting, Mr. Blanchard was the one to break the news to Miller that their request had been approved, and ASL 1-4 will be available to students in the district in the 2023-2024 school year.
