Egypt School for the Deaf Works Against Odds to Educate Children

Deaf children in Egypt face serious obstacles when seeking an education because many come from poor families and rural areas far from the capital, Cairo. Experts say nearly 5 million of Egypt’s 100 million residents are deaf, due in part to frequent intermarriage of close relatives.     Notwithstanding their broad smiles and bubbling enthusiasm, deaf children in Egypt must cope with serious challenges at the same time the organizations that work to educate them struggle to run quality programs.   Clair Malik, an educator who founded and built the Egyptian diocese of the Episcopal Church’s Deaf Unit from scratch in 1982, said the school must work not only with deaf children, but also with their parents, many of whom come from poor and rural areas and are often uneducated.   She said the school tries to teach the parents sign language to help them communicate with the children.   Malik, who studied at Gallaudet University for the deaf in Washington, D.C., even though she is not deaf, said there has been major progress in educating deaf people in recent years. Graduates of the Deaf Unit have gone on to attend university, she said, and Egypt now boasts sign-language interpreters on government TV and in at least one university.   Mary Ishaq, who runs the school, watches over the many details of how her staff interacts with the students. She told VOA there are both theoretical and practical aspects to educating deaf people:   “The children,” she said, “learn reading and writing from an academic perspective and then they learn a skill, so that they can earn a living and not depend on society to support them.”   The Rev. Clement Alfons, a deaf social worker, has worked to become a bridge between the deaf and those who can hear. He said he became involved with the deaf while growing up in Sudan and observing their hardships.   Father Alfons told VOA that deaf children like himself “were shoved aside by society and marginalized” wh