13
OCTOBER 2019
One offender worked extra hard for his diploma. He is the first hard of hearing offender to get his high school equivalency diploma with the Georgia Department of Corrections. He says after his mom passed away; she was his motivation to keep going.
Completing those programs and receiving the diplomas and certificates includes lots of hard work from the offenders, but they say a lot of their success is also due to help from the facility staff.
“Now that I’ve earned my GED, my goal is to pursue a trade and eventually college courses. I challenge each of you to continue to move forward. Being incarcerated is about rebuilding, rebuilding yourself and your life with a purpose,” says an offender at the graduation.
“It was one year, and three months and I took the ABE test and the teacher offered me to get a better GED test. I was willing to take it and had to improve my reading and math. I was hoping to pass the science portion. I got a score of 148. After that, I decided I wanted to drop out. But I thought, you know I’m going to go for it,” says the offender.
He kept working at it and eventually passed the reading, social studies, and math portions of the test. But he says some subjects were harder for him than others.
“The hardest part is the reading because I do not take English. Most of the time I use ASL instead of English and most of my family is deaf. I have two brothers that are deaf, so I did not know the words or use of English. So, I started to learn the words and picking up the vocabulary I needed for my reading and finally I passed,” he says.
The offender says three other hard of hearing offenders at Central State Prison are also trying to get their high school equivalency diploma. He says sometimes they use online teaching tools with captions or use an interpreter provided by the facility.
“He said after he goes through ABE he wanted to work on getting his GED and then he wants to quit. I said no do not quit, you can do it; you can get your GED. It is a lifetime goal. Then you do not have to worry about anything in the future, you will be able to get a job. It will be good for you,” he says.
The offender says he knows his mom would be proud to know he pursued his education and is encouraging other hard of hearing offenders to do the same.
“I respect from my heart my mom and I know she did not get to see it, but she is congratulating me for getting my GED. I can see in my head her smiling face and how happy she is,” he says.
He paved the way for other deaf and hard of hearing offenders and accomplished his education goals.