Pocono News Section

SSSD Rally in Harrisburg

SSSD Rally in Harrisburg - Wednesday, April 29, 2009 at 5:45PM EST

HARRISBURG -- Dozens of students and alumni of the Scranton State School for the Deaf made a statement in Harrisburg.
"The budget for 2009-2010, I'm giving it a grade of an F," said Mark Miller through an interpretor. He's the vice-president of SSSD's Alumni Association, and his nieces are third-generation students.

"I love the activities, I love the education, I love a lot of things there," said Kai Miller, a 5th grader at SSSD.

"Since joining SSSD, I've learned American sign language," said Byron Evans, a junior at SSSD, who previously attended a different deaf school and mainstream public school. "All my skills, my language skills, my academic skills have taken off."

Since the school was slated to close in February, supporters have collected more than 50,000 signatures, and students helped deliver them directly to Governor Rendell's office. Representative Kevin Murphy and more than 80 co-sponsors proposed House Bill 1318. If passed, the transitioning of SSSD becoming run by the Western Pennsylvania School for the deaf would be put on hold.

"I think if we were to allow this transition to take place, it would be a giant step backwards for special education in Pennsylvania," said Rep. Murphy (D-113th District).

But he hopes the proposal passes and Harrisburg studies the logistics and costs of closing the Scranton State School for the Deaf.

Senator Bob Mellow (D-22nd District) took a chartered flight last Thursday to the Western Pennsylvania School for the Deaf. He told Eyewitness News the transition plan for SSSD included WPSD taking over the school this summer, and he wanted to see the facilities firsthand. He also told us he didn't file an amendment to keep SSSD open and running under state control because he feels it would operate exactly the same way next year under private control.

Wednesday, Sen. Mellow released a column on the future of the SSSD. Here are portions of the column:

Several local legislators and I have left no stone unturned in evaluating alternatives and exploring all options to meet the needs of students. After all, the students are the ones who would suffer the most from the school’s scheduled closure on July 1. Without the kind of long-term solution we are currently working on to keep the facility operating, the school would indeed be closed and students dispersed to various intermediate units or dispatched to other areas of the state.

It is important to note that keeping this state-run school open indefinitely was not a viable option, and would have been nearly impossible to fund in this budget year where state lawmakers are struggling to find ways to make up an estimated $2.6 billion budget deficit. Even with some temporary reprieve, there would certainly be no guarantee that the school would survive the next time the Department of Education was tasked with making budget cuts. I am not willing to risk the future of these children and this century-old facility on band-aid reprieves. Too much is at stake.