Contact: Maridith Geuder
Janice Thompson isn't a Mississippi State student, but she certainly spends a lot of time in class.
Recently hired as the university's first deaf services coordinator, she uses sign language to interpret class lectures for hearing impaired students.
Thompson works in the Office of Student Support Services, which serves more than 200 disabled students on the Starkville campus. For more than two decades, the university has led the state and much of the region in educating students with a wide range of physical disabilities.
"We work with students who are hearing, vision, and mobility impaired, as well as those who are learning disabled," said associate office director Debbie Baker.
As the first full-time deaf services coordinator, Thompson has had to learn about subjects ranging from meteorology to Scandinavian history. One of her students is a geosciences major from South Mississippi.
"In this particular situation, we had to create words to help him better understand some of the concepts in Scandinavian history," she said. Laughing, she added: "When you don't know a word, you 'finger spell' or sometimes invent a word where there isn't one, such as 'Vikings.'"
An audiologist whose parents were deaf, Thompson said she believes that advocacy is an important part of her role at Mississippi State. "I discuss the needs of hearing impaired students with instructors, including seating and lip-reading," she explained.
"The students love her," said Debbie Baker of Thompson's efforts.
Like her students, Thompson must spend a good deal of time preparing outside of class. "I want to be familiar with concepts and with the language required," she said.
In addition to lectures, Thompson provides signing for the general conversations before class when students and professors frequently review and share information informally.
Baker said the support services office provides many resources for the hearing impaired because "it's essential to have someone who can speak the language of the people we're serving."
The office currently is exploring a variety of captioning and assistive listening devices that can help students, she said. "We're also identifying a pool of sign language interpreters with whom we can contract with on an as-needed basis."