By DAVID DUPONT
BG Independent News
The American Sign Language program at Bowing Green State University is being phased out as a result of budget cuts.
This has aroused criticism on the faculty listserv with calls to preserve the program. One commenter noted it comes at a time when signers have achieved added visibility thanks to the animated work of Marla Berkowitz, who signs for Gov. Mike DeWine during his COVID-19 press conferences.
College of Education and Human Development Dean Dawn Shinew said the decision to cut the ASL program was “gut wrenching.”
“It is a result of the budget cuts we took last spring in our college,” she said.
At that time the one full-time teaching faculty in the program was laid-off as part of university-wide cuts of Qualified Rank Faculty, however, that individual was rehired this summer to help phase out the program.
Though the initial plan was to cut the program completely, the decision was made instead to continue to offer the third and fourth level courses so those students who had taken the first two ASL courses to complete the sequence.
“I think message (that the program was ending) just got lost in the barrage of other messages. What has become clear some students felt they were caught off guard,” Shinew said.
Those students who didn’t get the message and weren’t able to complete the sequence will be guaranteed to be able to complete it.
Shinew said the program is “enormously popular.”
It draws students from outside the college. Students in the College of Arts and Science can use it to complete their foreign language requirement. Other students are interested in learning both the language and about deaf culture. For others it enhances their professional development.
Most of the majors in the College of Education and Human Development, though, don’t require electives, and if they do there are other ways to meet them.
Learning ASL is “not required in any program,” Shinew said. There are options for meeting the requirements for students taking those courses.
“This doesn’t mean those are necessarily equivalent options,” Shinew said. “This was a unique experience, and there’s a loss to that. But from a degree-completion perspective there are other options for students that still kept them on track for a degree.”
Shinew said: “We spent a lot of time and energy building this program. We knew it brought something unique to BGSU and to the community, and it in no way means we don’t think those things are important to community. We have to balance all the important things.”
But the alternative was cutting courses that students need to for licensure, certification, and to earn their degrees .
“Our first priority is getting our students through their degree programs in a timely matter and not creating delays because courses they needed were not being offered,” she said.
While BGSU has offered ASL 1 and 2 for many years, the two advanced courses were added to the curriculum about three years ago. Finding an instructor for those courses is difficult, Shinew said.
The college is exploring other ways of offering an American Sign program. This could draw on the examples of collaborative programs in nursing and pharmacy.
“We’re looking into some innovative partnerships that would continue give BGSU student access to ASL,” she said. But she’s unsure what that may look like.
“If you had asked me last year if we would have been able to deliver many of our classes effectively online, I would have said ‘no.’ But in reality I think we learned that some may be better that way,” she said. “I don’t know that’s the case with ASL. But we see possibilities now that we didn’t see when we made these decisions back in May and June.”
