Miss-Delectable
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http://www.telegram.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060406/NEWS/604060548/1008/NEWS02
Grant provides 5 part-time jobs
Deaf rape victims will now be able to communicate with counselors who speak their language.
Five deaf women have been trained as rape counselors this month, through a collaboration of the Rape Crisis Center of Central Massachusetts, Our Deaf Sisters’ Center and the Center for Living and Working.
The program is believed to be the first of its kind in the state, said Andrew Plunkett, spokesman for the Executive Office of Public Safety, which funded the program with a $31,000 grant.
The effort eliminates the need for a translator, he said.
“There’s definitely a need because the challenges this population faces on a day-to-day basis increases dramatically with the trauma that they’re going through,” Mr. Plunkett said.
The counselors will work part time. They received 45 hours of education toward the crisis center’s standard certification training, which incorporated competencies in communication and deaf culture issues.
Marianne Winters, Rape Crisis Center executive director, cited research that predicted 60 percent of women with hearing impairments would be physically abused at some point in their lives. According to the state Commission on Deaf and Hard of Hearing, there are 212,000 deaf women in Massachusetts.
Research on rape victims is still in the early stages and the crime often goes underreported, Ms. Winters said.
“The small amount of research that has been done is showing much higher incidence (of sexual abuse) among deaf women,” she said. “Part of the explanation for that could be many deaf children are actually exposed to more people in residential settings. Or if they get their education in more of a deaf learning environment rather than at home.”
Ms. Winters said this has been highlighted by the 2004 class-action suit against the defunct Boston School for the Deaf, in which a number of former students accused the school’s staff of sexual and other abuses from 1944 to 1977.
The training of deaf rape counselors sprung from the crisis center’s three-year “Project Safe,” a needs assessment and strategic plan looking at the wider community’s capacity to serve people with a disability, with federal backing, Ms. Winters said.
Denise Roy, project and volunteer manager for the center, said deaf counselors would help the rape victims navigate services designed for hearing people.
“It’s difficult when folks serve a different culture, and don’t understand your culture,” Ms. Roy said. “So there’s a fear of not being served and not being understood.” Next week the program will hold a project implementation board meeting, made up of 11 members of the deaf community, and will continue with outreach and community education.
Other than the Abused Deaf Women’s Advocacy Services, in Seattle, and SafePlace in Austin, Texas, Ms. Roy said, the availability of deaf rape counselors is limited nationally.
Grant provides 5 part-time jobs
Deaf rape victims will now be able to communicate with counselors who speak their language.
Five deaf women have been trained as rape counselors this month, through a collaboration of the Rape Crisis Center of Central Massachusetts, Our Deaf Sisters’ Center and the Center for Living and Working.
The program is believed to be the first of its kind in the state, said Andrew Plunkett, spokesman for the Executive Office of Public Safety, which funded the program with a $31,000 grant.
The effort eliminates the need for a translator, he said.
“There’s definitely a need because the challenges this population faces on a day-to-day basis increases dramatically with the trauma that they’re going through,” Mr. Plunkett said.
The counselors will work part time. They received 45 hours of education toward the crisis center’s standard certification training, which incorporated competencies in communication and deaf culture issues.
Marianne Winters, Rape Crisis Center executive director, cited research that predicted 60 percent of women with hearing impairments would be physically abused at some point in their lives. According to the state Commission on Deaf and Hard of Hearing, there are 212,000 deaf women in Massachusetts.
Research on rape victims is still in the early stages and the crime often goes underreported, Ms. Winters said.
“The small amount of research that has been done is showing much higher incidence (of sexual abuse) among deaf women,” she said. “Part of the explanation for that could be many deaf children are actually exposed to more people in residential settings. Or if they get their education in more of a deaf learning environment rather than at home.”
Ms. Winters said this has been highlighted by the 2004 class-action suit against the defunct Boston School for the Deaf, in which a number of former students accused the school’s staff of sexual and other abuses from 1944 to 1977.
The training of deaf rape counselors sprung from the crisis center’s three-year “Project Safe,” a needs assessment and strategic plan looking at the wider community’s capacity to serve people with a disability, with federal backing, Ms. Winters said.
Denise Roy, project and volunteer manager for the center, said deaf counselors would help the rape victims navigate services designed for hearing people.
“It’s difficult when folks serve a different culture, and don’t understand your culture,” Ms. Roy said. “So there’s a fear of not being served and not being understood.” Next week the program will hold a project implementation board meeting, made up of 11 members of the deaf community, and will continue with outreach and community education.
Other than the Abused Deaf Women’s Advocacy Services, in Seattle, and SafePlace in Austin, Texas, Ms. Roy said, the availability of deaf rape counselors is limited nationally.