Gallaudet assistant coach Shelby Bean, left, coaches players during football practice at Hotchkiss Field, Tuesday, Oct. 10, 2023, in Washington. As a Deaf football player for four years at Gallaudet, Bean called defensive plays with American Sign Language and dealt …As a deaf football player for four years at Gallaudet, he called defensive plays with American Sign Language and dealt with other obstacles hearing opponents never need to worry about.
The innovations outside sports date to at least 1965, when Gallaudet was responsible for the first Dictionary of American Sign Language. The school has since pioneered the use of video phones on campus and the development of translation and ASL recognition applications. Current work includes ways to improve the accuracy of closed captioning.
“Gallaudet University is really the center of the Deaf community,” junior offensive lineman John Scarborough said in ASL through an interpreter. “We’re basically creating history. Usually that first step leads you to huge milestone down the road. I’m sure that my teammates are proud of the history we were able to make and the potential impact that we’re going to have on millions of deaf people, deaf kids around the world.
“This is just the beginning,” Goldstein said. “This was the experiment - and seeing what this could do and what this could do for not just us but deaf and hard-of-hearing athletes.” “We re mostly thinking about employment opportunities,” Behm said in ASL through an interpreter. “So, if you have a deaf worker in a construction site or building skyscrapers, apartment buildings, whatever, you have somebody working up on the second floor and they’re deaf, hearing folks may be on the first floor trying to get their attention thinking how they can communicate with them.”
Jason Altmann, P-X-P’s chief operating officer, has seen plenty of innovations not go anywhere because members of the Deaf and hard-of-hearing community were not involved in the process.