Imagine having a bright new day but you are unable to see it. Imagine wanting to go somewhere but your legs cannot take you. Imagine having a troubled mind but you can’t tell anyone because you cannot speak. This is the everyday plight of PERSONS WITH DISABILITIES who live in a life so strange that one can hardly imagine. And they remain perhaps the most marginalised people in today’s world. As if robbing their helplessness on their faces, their high level of stigmatization adds to their burden. Despite the clear challenges they face, very little is done to include their welfare in the planning of the society.
While some regard persons with disabilities as non productive members of the society, few believe they are blessed with the most incredible talents that have remained unharnessed. Special School for the Deaf, Odoakpu, Onitsha is one of the two schools established to cater for the development of the deaf in Anambra State. This school bubbles with the energy, creativity and also the vulnerabilities of seven hundred of the estimated eight thousand deaf people in Anambra. The school is struggling to operate with many deficiencies that make the special needs of these people to be scarcely met. For example, with no hostel facility, students have to come from unimaginably distant places to learn. Imagine the financial burden this poses on this low-income population, resulting to some affording to come to school only once or twice a week.
In a much-needed philanthropic gesture, Special School for the Deaf, Odoakpu have received a donation of one hundred and fifty-capacity hostel building and a two hundred-capacity classroom block from Godwin and Patricia Okeke Foundation. This worthy project came as a result of a needs assessment done in line with the curriculum demand of assistive learning in the digital age. The initiative is aimed to make education more accessible, reduce the cost of learning, improve learning conditions, and to open up the potential of new learning fields for the students of this school.
The one hundred and twenty five million naira project was motivated out of the recognition of the talent stock of these HEARING IMPAIRED students by Chief Godwin and Patricia Okeke, the founders of this noble philanthropic foundation. They visualized a bigger picture where the ball is set for higher things to come through effective learning and intellectual empowerment.
As this new phase of life begins for the deaf community at the Special School for the deaf Odoakpu and in Anambra State in general, against being seen as a project accomplished, it is more of a journey just starting if the potential of this humongous project is to be realized. This is because, with this new set of hostel block comes the need to feed the students who are now afforded the opportunity to live in a boarding facility.
In the same vein, with this new set of classroom block arises the need to equip the facility with assistive learning technologies and to train teachers, especially STEM teachers in the use of sign language to improve communication and achieve deeper learning. Therefore, today we extend a call for help, a call to extend a helping hand to students with hearing impairment. It is a call for partnership, a call for professional engagement through training and donations and ultimately a call to improve learning for the deaf community in Anambra State.
The hearing-impaired must not be beggars. The visually-impaired must not be illiterate. The physically-challenged persons must not be a nuisance to the community. We hold the key to achieve these. Let the compassion in us spur us to action to create a better life for them.
Written by TOBECHI ONWUBUCHE
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