Presentation at Edmonds Community College
Our interpreter, Monique Roberts, and I flew to Seattle and drove to Lynnwood, Washington for two nights. We gave a hour long presentation to a group of 120 students, teachers and community members. It went very well. We also raised $67 for The Laurent Institute — a small but important step towards establishing an endowment fund for the community as well as covering our operating costs. Thank you, good folks of Washington!
M.E. Barwacz just recently gave a presentation to a group called Council of Exceptional Students in Brookings, S.D. The presentation was well received, and The Laurent Institute received a $75 donation from their organization. Thank you!
We are truly enjoying the metro Seattle area. We went to see locks in Ballard, then drove through downtown Seattle and ate at P.F. Chang’s. We just love Chang’s Spicy Chicken! Hmmmm…. Now if only they would come and build one in Sioux Falls. Soon, probably.
We also were impressed with our hosts here — Tom Murphy and his wife, Sue Hart, Ruben Alatorre and Dee Olson. We felt so welcomed by them. Thanks for making our stay even more enjoyable.
Stay tuned for more announcements from The Laurent Institute for raising funds.
May 4th, 2006 at 8:08 pm
I was at the EdCC presentation. As a hearing ASL student I think the idea of a community composed primarily (if not fully) of signers is a fantastic idea. I had to leave at 1:30, but one question I was curious about is this.If you want to promote tourism as heavily as the presentation implied, how will that factor in to the signing society? As a large part of the tourist will be non-signers, won’t the hearing portion of the community really be the "face" of Laurent?
May 4th, 2006 at 8:09 pm
A very good question! Someone actually asked a similiar question, and my answer is: We won’t really know that until we build the town. It is easier to assume that hearing signers would be the face of the town, however, to be more accurate, it would be the business owners and service providers who has a storefront on main streets of Laurent. It’s reasonable to conclude that a good number of these will be operated by deaf people, and as business owners, they have every incentive to interact with their customers and do it well — even making it memorable, to ensure the customers, including non-signer visitors, come back repeatedly. Should we even have city-paid (through tourism and convention bureau) staff of interpreters wearing certain colors and clothing mingling in the streets being available to tourists for their convenience? Or should we limit ourselves to a "Quick ASL" handbook to be distributed freely in every store? Ideas aplenty. What do you think will really happen?
May 4th, 2006 at 8:09 pm
I like the idea of Laurent Co. presenting a Quick ASL handbook of phrases, so to speak. Non-signers, in my experience, enjoy participating in the transactions directly. It also gives us local "signer neophytes" more understanding of the nuances of signing as well as (enjoyable learning) practice. As we all age, new mental challenges are shown to increase our mental longevity! So another benefit to the surrounding community(s).