Introduction: The DESK Program

The purpose of the DESK (Developing English Skills and Knowledge) Program at Louisiana State University (LSU) has been, from its beginning, to assist deaf and hard of hearing students in  making a smooth transition from high school to post-secondary institutions, and in doing so ensure their academic and professional success.
 

The Evolution of the DESK Program:

The DESK Program has existed in two forms prior to its present one.  Initially, the DESK Program was conceived of as a tutoring service offered by the Office of Disability Services at LSU to deaf and hard of hearing students to help them strengthen their reading comprehension and written composition skills.  Students would work on their targeted needs areas primarily through one-on-one meetings with the Program Director.  Tutoring sessions were intended to help students improve their reading and writing skills while they work on actual assignments in their courses.  However, while students expressed interest and enthusiasm when the DESK program was introduced and explained in an orientation meeting and through mailed brochures, very few students used the tutoring service. 

Consequently, we decided to move the point of assistance from the post-secondary institution to the secondary institution, and we began working with two local high schools: the high school at Louisiana School for the Deaf (LSD), a K-12 residence school, and Lee High School, a public high school with deaf and hard of hearing students who are either diploma-bound and mainstreamed or certificate-bound and in a self-contained classroom.  After initial fact-finding meetings with teachers at both schools,  we devised a menu of student self-advocacy, study skills, and writing workshops (see page 4).  Each of the schools were asked to select workshops they felt were most appropriate to their students, and these workshops were scheduled and held in the spring semester of 1999.  While all these workshops were well received, it became apparent that the greatest need and interest was in the area of English writing skills. 
 

The DESK Program Today:

In its final and present form, the DESK Program focuses exclusively on English skills and is being offered to four high school English classes at Louisiana School for the Deaf. 

Approximately every other week during the school year, the DESK Program Director visits Louisiana School for the Deaf and conducts workshops for these English classes.  Each  workshop, which lasts one fifty-minute class period, is conducted twice during each visit in back-to-back class periods.  Two of the normally separate English classes meet together for each of the two workshops sessions; approximately fifteen students attend each workshop. 

The main goal of these workshops is to introduce the students to the type of writing that is required in college freshman composition courses.  In doing so, the hope is that the students not only become better prepared for college writing but are also better prepared for the entire college experience. 
 

The DESK Program Director:

Dr. Jean Rohloff is the DESK Program Director and conducts all the meetings of the DESK Program at Louisiana School for the Deaf.   Dr. Rohloff holds a doctoral degree in English literature from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and is a member of the English Department at LSU.  Her course load routinely includes freshman composition as well as literature courses. 

As a teacher of freshman composition, Dr. Rohloff has had many deaf and hard of hearing students in her courses.  Although Dr. Rohloff has taken some entry-level sign language classes and has rudimentary skills in sign language, she uses a sign language interpreter for her deaf students at LSU and in her meetings with students at LSD.

There are two important reasons that the DESK Program is directed by a person who is not fluent in ASL and has no formal training in deaf education.  First, if, as we hope, this program is to be duplicated at other post-secondary institutions, it is necessary that all institutions have faculty in place who can direct such a program.  To put it simply, all post-secondary institutions have  teachers trained in English literature and/or composition; not all post-secondary institutions have teachers trained in deaf education and/or ASL.  Thus, it is our hope that any post-secondary institution can duplicate LSU’s DESK Program.

The second reason for having the DESK Program directed by faculty member untrained in ASL and/or deaf education is because unless students plan to attend a deaf university or a post-secondary institution with a large population of deaf and hard of hearing students, most of the instructors that students will encounter will not be proficient in sign language.  In fact, the reality is that students may encounter instructors with no experience with deaf or hard of hearing students or even, worse, instructors who are not amenable to working with such students or accommodating their needs. Therefore, having a director who is not fluent in sign language but who is eager to work with deaf and hard of hearing students can serve to provide a transition between their present experience of having deaf educators and their possible future experiences in the post-secondary institution.
 

The DESK Program and Handbook:

This handbook puts into a “how-to” format Dr. Rohloff’s visits to Louisiana School for the Deaf  in the spring semester of 1999 and the entire school year of 1999-2000.

Each chapter consists of objectives, materials, preparation (when necessary), procedure, and comments (when appropriate).  Supplementary materials, many of which are meant to be duplicated in the form of handouts or overhead transparencies, are also included.

While the sequence of these workshops replicates, for the most part, the sequence of Dr. Rohloff’s visits to LSD, it is not meant to be a hard and fast one.  For example, Workshop One: Getting Acquainted would  logically be the first workshop.  Also, multiple workshops that develop a single concept, such as Workshop Two, Three and Four on evaluation essays or Workshop Six, Seven, and Eight on comparison/contrast essays, would best be done in sequence.  Beyond these, however, the workshops can be conducted in any sequence.  Also, depending on the skill level of the students, class size or time constraints, workshops can be divided and conducted in two, or more, class periods.

Finally, this handbook is very much a work in progress.  As the DESK Program at LSU continues, we hope to revise this handbook to reflect our ongoing work. 
 

Working with the High School Teachers:

Essential to the success of LSU’s DESK Program has been the valuable cooperation and assistance of the high school teachers at Louisiana School for the Deaf. 

We routinely asked for input and suggestions from the high school teachers and, whenever possible, coordinated the workshops with the teachers’ curricula.   Many of the workshops require the students to complete work in advance, and it was important that such work did not place any undue burden on the students or teachers.  It was also important that the DESK Program did not in any way appear to be compensating for any deficiency in the students’ education.  Rather, we worked very hard to make it clear to the teachers and the students that the DESK Program was meant to reinforce what was already being taught in the high school classes. 

In any replication of the DESK Program, the program director(s) must develop a rapport with the teachers and frequently discuss the plans and progress of the program.  Each high school teacher should have a copy of the DESK Program Handbook or similar workshop plans. 

• Self-Advocacy: How to Receive Appropriate Accommodations in College
• Your ADA Rights in College
• Utilizing your Resources in College
• How to Prepare for College

• Time Management
• Goal Setting
• College Reading
• Vocabulary Development
• Test Preparation & Test Taking
• Learning Styles
• Note taking
• Math & Problem Solving

• Strategies in Comparing and Contrasting
• Strategies in Evaluating
• Strategies in Process Analysis
• Strategies in Solving Problems
• Choosing, Developing and Researching Topics
• Writing Under Pressure
• Proofreading