Carter Churchill Human Rights Hearing

Alex: About a month ago in St. John’s, Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada, there was a nine-day human rights hearing on a discrimination complaint from the parents of an 11-year-old deaf child named Carter Churchill. The parents, Todd and Kim — who are hearing — said the Eastern School District failed to provide Carter with a quality education that was accessible in Carter’s first language, ASL. The hearing was live-streamed and had sign language interpreters.

Newfoundland used to have a deaf school, but it closed in 2010, a year before Carter was born. The school provided an array of services for deaf children but these programs ended. Here is a remark from a deaf resident of St. John’s.

Bryan Johnson: When the deaf school closed in 2010, its programs for deaf children such as home visits, ASL classes, AVT (audio-verbal therapy), and other programs, were thrown out. It was like everything was swept away.

Alex: Carter received cochlear implants after he was born and received auditory-verbal therapy. Carter’s parents said the hospital discouraged ASL but the parents went ahead and took ASL courses.

Here is a clip.

Todd Churchill, via Convo interpreter: Here in Newfoundland, when a child is identified as deaf, they are given two choices: cochlear implants or ASL. And you can’t use both. We made the decision for Carter to get cochlear implants. But at the same time, we still used ASL with him because we didn’t feel that the implants made him “hearing.” He is still a deaf person. When he was a baby, we used ASL, while he was an infant. We kept it a secret that we used sign language because it is discouraged by the hospital. If you have cochlear implants, you’re not supposed to do that, to be signing with your baby. So we had to sign only at home and keep it concealed and not tell anyone.

Kim Churchill, via Convo interpreter: We are hearing. So for ourselves, we tried to learn sign language at the same time as him. We took classes with a local deaf association. We went as far as we could. We are continuing to learn and take online courses. But in the meantime, our child is completely ignored. He does not have any access to his language at all. This situation is just setting him up to fail because he started kindergarten with no language.

Alex: Here are remarks from Dr. Kristin Snoddon, a deaf education expert who is a professor at the Toronto Metropolitan University. She testified in support of the Churchills during the hearing. She will provide a recap of the situation.

Dr. Kristin Snoddon: Carter is now 11 years old. Throughout his entire life, he’s never had enough access to ASL. He was born in 2011. He was identified as deaf. He received cochlear implants and auditory-verbal therapy. Early in his childhood, people said he needed sign language as he was not picking up on speaking verbally or hearing skills. Audiologists, SLPs (speech therapists), AVT specialists, all agreed that he needed sign language. But he didn’t get early intervention services until Carter’s mom found out that the school board/district had something — itinerant teachers of the deaf who traveled around. They provided some home visits or some kind of services. But Carter received that later. So when he enrolled in kindergarten, the school was not ready. They weren’t prepared with bringing in a teacher or a signing assistant or… really, it was nothing. He didn’t have services. His parents started fighting for him in 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, and 2020. They fought for basic access to sign language in the classroom. That’s pretty much it. The school district did bring in teachers with some sign skills, but they were never tested on if they were actually proficient. There were student assistants that came in but they weren’t good at signing. There was a deaf student assistant that was brought in, but they weren’t with Carter all day. So there was little thought.

Alex: Carter’s parents hoped the school district would be prepared to provide ASL support, but they said the school was not prepared at all. When Carter enrolled in kindergarten in 2016, he was the only deaf kid in a school with about 750 students. Carter’s parents said he only had between 1 to 2 hours of ASL in a week.

Kim Churchill: It is a disaster because whatever little ASL he knows, he’s stopped using it. We saw him declining during his first year because if you’re in a room with a group of people who don’t use the language that you know, why would you be motivated to use it? If they can’t communicate with you, then you wouldn’t try to communicate with them. So (Carter) is only five. He didn’t understand that all the other people were communicating in a different language. He’s watching them play with each other, laughing, sharing jokes, and having fun. And he is just being neglected and left out. He’s isolated every day for years at this school.

Alex: Kim testified that Carter’s student assistants during kindergarten, who were supposed to know ASL, did not even know how to fingerspell their name or how to sign certain colors. The parents said the school doesn’t even test their staff on their ASL skills.

The parents said they tried to get the school district to provide better services for him that included ASL, but after their efforts were constantly frustrated, they decided to file a human rights complaint in 2017, at the end of Carter’s kindergarten school year.

They hired an attorney named Kyle Rees and have spent tens of thousands of dollars in legal fees up to this point. The parents said they saw some, but very little, improvements after their complaint. They said they feel that the school district “hoped” to just stall things and have the parents give up on their fight.

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The human rights commission’s adjudicator, Brodie Gallant, said in his opening remarks during the hearing that “the decision in this case is important because it could help define what inclusive, meaningful access to education really is…”

The school district’s attorney said the district did not discriminate against Carter and said it has provided him with different kinds of support. Their position is that they provided reasonable accommodations and that while it was not perfect, reasonableness is the standard.

A deaf woman named Tammy Vaters, who worked with Carter for several years as a student assistant, testified that she had to go beyond her role as a student assistant to act as a deaf interpreter, advocate, and even as a teacher, because the school did not meet Carter’s needs.

I asked Bryan Johnson to provide a perspective on the hearing.

Bryan Johnson: Deaf education here is bad. During the hearing, which I’ve watched, our Deaf community has expressed concerns about ASL. If the adjudicator concludes that the school board did things correctly, it means that (ASL) programs may not survive. It could lead to the decline of ASL. But if Carter’s side wins, then (ASL) programs may expand. Employment opportunities for deaf people could increase. So a lot is riding on it. It was a long, nine-day hearing. It’s a huge issue.

Alex: Kim said she found out during the hearing that Carter, who is in sixth grade, is still being taught at the kindergarten level. Carter is currently in an ASL immersive classroom, which is considered a better environment for him, but the parents are concerned that the school district is still failing to commit to offering this kind of ASL access in the future.

I asked Carter’s parents what the worst case scenario would be and the best case scenario would be now that they have completed the human rights hearing.

Todd Churchill: The worst-case scenario would be if the adjudicator determines that there was no discrimination and that everything that was done to Carter was appropriate and reasonable. That would be scary. I struggle to even say this because it is just so tremendously scary. Because if that happens, every deaf child will be discriminated against. And whatever we are doing will be used against those children. Others will say, “Look, according to the report, we didn’t discriminate. So we can do this again and again and get away with it because we got away with it before. So that’s the worst case. The best case scenario would be to have the adjudicator come out with a strongly-worded statement that concludes that Carter was definitely discriminated against. That others were unqualified and that this was a clear and obvious instance of discrimination. That way, we would have a very strong finding, hopefully, and a strong recommendation from the adjudicator to prevent this from happening to not only Carter but to other deaf children all over so no other family will go through what we have experienced with our deaf child. That would be the best case. The worst case is scary.

Alex: The hearing concluded on September 9. Both sides will be able to submit further written submissions and then there will be a period of deliberation before the adjudicator makes a decision. I was told that it could take a few months or even years before such a decision is made.

Carter’s parents are providing updates on their Facebook page, “Deaf Children Matter.” They have set up a GoFundMe to help with their legal fees. The parents paid out of their pockets to cover the cost of a transcriber for the hearing and the transcript of the hearing is 2,430 pages. It is available to read online. The link is in the status description.

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/deafchildrenmatter

Transcript: https://www.carterchurchill.ca/transcripts-human-rights-board-of-inquiry-2022.html