DEAFNESS NO OBSTACLE TO LEARNING; STUDENTS LIP READ, HAVE INTERPRETERS

Tracy Smith, Karen Meyer and Jamie Frost "listen" to their Southeast Missouri State University professors. They just don't hear.

Instead, they read lips and rely on the assistance of interpreters in the classrooms.

"They all lip read very well," said Vicki Rubenacker of Sikeston, one of three interpreters who attend classes with the students. "They are very independent."

The interpreters are paid by the Missouri Division of Vocational Rehabilitation. The university, however, has also spent its own funds on special equipment to aid the students at least some of it required by federal law.

The university has installed nearly 40 strobe lights in the Towers South dormitory where the students live. The lights are connected to the building's fire alarm system, explained Bill Frayser of the university's physical plant.

In addition, the students have been given personal pagers that vibrate. The pagers, through indicator lights, can alert the students to whether someone is at their dorm door, a fire alarm has sounded, or someone is calling on the special telephones that have been installed in their rooms.

Special vibrators that perform the same functions as the pagers have been hooked up to their beds as well, Frayser said.

Each student has a Telecommunication Device for the Deaf, or TDD. It's a special phone that has a keyboard and a printout screen. Students communicate by typing on the keyboard rather than speaking.

The university has purchased a number of the phones and installed them in various campus offices.

Frayser said the university has spent more than $4,500 on various equipment to assist the deaf students and some 230 labor hours to install it.

The three deaf students from the St. Louis area are attending their first semester at Southeast. Frost is a sophomore; Smith and Meyer are freshmen.

All three students, who are friends, say they feel right at home among their classmates. They don't dwell on their deafness.

"Being deaf is just hearing with the eyes," said the 17-year-old Meyer.

"We can do anything we want except hear," said Frost, who is attending Southeast on a scholarship and wants to become a lawyer for the deaf in St. Louis.

"There are a lot of (deaf) people in St. Louis. They have no help," he said. "I have a chance to help them."

Meyer rooms with Smith, 19, on the third floor of Towers South dormitory. Frost, 19, has a room on the fourth floor of the building.

Despite being deaf, all three students are talkative. In an interview Thursday, the three students often interrupted each other in their zest to answer questions.

Frost relies basically on speaking to communicate. But Smith and Meyer also use sign language in communicating at times with each other and interpreters.

All three students went to regular high schools. As such, they say they are used to learning in a "hearing" environment.

Frost said that being deaf does pose some problems. "It's hard for us to get to know people."

But that's not the case for Meyer, who admits to being "outgoing."

Meyer plays any number of intramural sports. "I am a sports freak," she happily said. Smith also enjoys sports.

Meyer said she loves to dance. She dances to the vibrations of sound generated by the music.

Meyer isn't shy about speaking up. She readily chimed in during the interview, often speaking and signing to interpreter Rubenacker at the same time.

In fact, Meyer's hands move so fast in signing words that Rubenacker even has trouble keeping up. "I wish she wouldn't do that. She spells so fast," said Rubenacker.

She often doesn't wait for the interpreter to relay a message. "I just talk," said Meyer.

"I never had an interpreter in high school," she explained. But she admitted that having an interpreter in class is a great help.

Although only 17, Meyer is very independent. She has had to be: both her parents are deaf and her brother is hearing impaired.

"I have no fears," said the energetic and amiable Meyer.

Smith maintains one advantage to deafness is "not hearing noises when you are sleeping."

Both Smith and Meyer not only are roommates, but they are fellow sorority sisters, having joined Alpha Xi Delta Sorority. Southeast student and interpreter Valerie Kline serves as their "pledge mother."

Frost is a member of Lambda Chi Alpha.

Meyer said she believes that being around deaf students has made her sorority sisters more aware of deafness.

Smith and Meyer are teaching sign language to their friends and sorority sisters.

Rubenacker, who is taking off-campus classes in education, says she is enjoying her job as interpreter. "It's been nice," said Rubenacker, who has previously handled interpreter jobs in Southern Illinois and in Sikeston.

As an interpreter, Rubenacker sits through a variety of classes with the students. But unlike the students, she's not there to learn the subject matter.

"Sometimes it goes in your ears and right out your hands," she said.