Agape Pah

Check out agapepah.com to see what's coming up as we develop community and education related to the bridge between the Deaf World and the Hearing World.

09/09/2024

I've been away from posting on Instagram for a while.

We moved from Kentucky to Georgia and still getting our family routine organized, including child care for the kids and employment for myself.

We also have some more exciting news:

Baby #4 will be here in March!

It feels like all sign language communicating women I follow on Instagram are pregnant or just had a baby (, , and ), lol!

If any service providing agency would be interested in training (virtually or in person) how to most effectively serve Deaf/ hard of hearing clients/ customers, contact me and we can still get something scheduled, even in this season of kids in 4 different stages of development in our home: elementary, preschool, toddler, and fetus!

04/01/2024

The train has arrived. We've moved to Georgia! But we're still settling in and getting adjusted, so I have not done any work on Agape Pah in weeks.... but know that this is not the end of me! 😆😃 When I come back at this, I will have twice the energy and excitement that I did before our move!

02/29/2024

Still going through boxes of "random things" while packing to move and found a brochure from Relay Iowa.

Here's a friendly reminder to answer phone calls from relay services, whether the Deaf person is using a TTY (less common) or a video phone.

You will lose business from the Deaf Community by hanging up on calls that use a "3rd party" to relay the conversation with a deaf, hard of hearing, or deaf-blind person.

02/05/2024

American Sign Language is a language with its own grammar and syntaxes.

Not knowing any American Sign Language, and communicating with a Deaf sign language user in short written communication, a hearing person could get confused by the Deaf person's word choices or word order if the Deaf person is most comfortable with using American Sign Language.

I am often impressed with many Deaf people who can go back and forth quickly communicating in English and American Sign Language!

An example of the difference between English and ASL is shown in many of Mandy Harvey's music videos. Of course, she also takes creative liberties to make the performance look good. In this one: https://lnkd.in/gGVNPN_m
she sings: Weight is pulling me under; I'm no stranger to the deep end, but this time I've fallen farther.
Her ASL is: Responsibility/ burden, experienced that up until now, but worse now.

01/23/2024

Check out for this whole post about the Deaf performers who will be signing the songs/ performances at the Super Bowl.

I did not realize (but now, looking back at each year, I believe it) that since the Super Bowl started having interpreters for the national anthem, there was only one year that the interpreter was on screen the entire time, providing access to the performance for Deaf people watching the Super Bowl all over the world.

There is a petition out for that to happen again. Don't make the Deaf community download a separate app to watch the performances in sign language again like last year. Let's just put the ASL on the screen the whole time.

01/22/2024

Perspective!

Do problems you're are facing right now feel like giants??!

I'm going to risk being controversial for a moment and mention a bible story...

Moses was promised the .... promised land... so there were a group of men who went to check out the land before having everyone move in. Most of those men who went to check out what their promised land looked like only saw the big, scary, overwhelming thing in the land. They saw the giants.

Two of the twelve men (Caleb and Joshua) focused on the opportunities in the land.

When you see something new, do you focus on the big, scary, overwhelming parts, or do you focus on the opportunities that will come your way after those big scary things are "taken care of"?

If you would like 5 tips to overcome the scary accessibility requests from Deaf people check out my 5 tips for accessibility by entering you name and email address at www.agapepah.com/5ways

01/05/2024

Has your business been reviewed by Deaf Friendly? What would the Deaf Community say about your business?

Did you know that also provides training to businesses to help them become Deaf-friendly?

So, what's the difference between my business and theirs, you may ask.

Echo, at Deaf-friendly, comes with personal Deaf experience.

I come with social service experience and experience going from clueless about Deafness before 2010 to living on the bridge between the Deaf World and Hearing World today.

Check out what Echo is doing. She's great!

If you provide a social service and want your meetings with your Deaf clients to be more accessible and Deaf-friendly, check out www.agapepah.com/5ways and grab my free pdf with 5 tips to make your meetings more accessible to you first, or next, Deaf client or customer.

12/18/2023

Going from social worker to online business owner, there is a learning curve!

I captioned the recording after some other minor hiccups (Zoom recordings provide the transcript, but if you want those captions on the recording, it needs to be done a different way, and I'm still figuring out the ways)

I also learned, in the past 24 hours, that there is a maximum size of file that can be loaded onto a Coursie website, and there are different ways to compress files. Those file compressors cost to compress larger files.

This is not something I expected to learn when I decided to get a social work degree.

If you want to learn about providing services to the Deaf World (the content in this video), go to agapepah.com/webinar

12/15/2023

What are the 10 biggest barriers to serving Deaf customers?

According to ChatGPT:
"10. Limited Availability of Information in Sign Language: Information, including written materials and online content, may not be readily available in sign language. This can limit the ability of Deaf individuals to access important information independently."

This is the same as the lack of available sign language interpreters. Often, who knows about this better than the Deaf people themselves.

American Sign Language is often the best way to make your information accessible, but it is not always the only way.

If you can have your information interpreted into sign language, I would suggest that you post that for the world (or at least the Deaf World) to see.

If sign language interpretation of your information is not available, the “next best” option is to make sure that information is simplified for everyone to consume. Often, with many Deaf people not having any Deaf family members and limited access to the Deaf Community or other sign language users, that leads to language deprivation. Trying to read words, but never hearing what the word sounds like and missing out on learning meanings of words without “overhearing” conversations early in life, Deaf people often (not always) have lower reading and writing abilities.

Simplifying written information can benefit not only your potential Deaf and hard of hearing clients, but it can benefit all potential clients to understand the information.

12/14/2023

First, my 2nd of 3 free webinars about serving the Deaf Community will be live on less than an hour, and you can still hop on by going to www.agapepah.com/webinar and pick the Dec 14 option! (Or Dec 21, if you want to wait until next week)

On to my daily post: What are the 10 biggest barriers to serving Deaf customers?

According to ChatGPT:
"9. Physical Barriers: Physical spaces may pose challenges for Deaf customers. For example, lack of visual cues or poor lighting in customer service areas can make communication difficult."

In a waiting room, is the client/ patients name called, or is someone willing to go up to the person and gesture to them to let them know it is their turn to be seen?

If a Deaf or hard of hearing person is trying to lip read (30% of the English language can be understood on the lips), is there a glare or a shadow on the speakers face, or worse yet, are they wearing a mask, preventing the Deaf/HH person from understanding what is said?

Is the area where communication is taking place “visually distracting”? Are there things or people moving around. Are there distracting colors, lights, or signs?

Checking in at a desk, is the person sitting at that desk looking at a computer screen, or are they looking at the client/customer?

These are all things to consider when providing a service to a Deaf/HH person.

Address

Lexington, KY
40511

Website

http://www.agapepah.com/

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