• Level of teaching is low.
• No knowledge of Sign Language as a language with its own grammar.
• Using the oral method.
• No knowledge about Deaf Culture and Deaf History.
• Poor efforts to teach deaf children equally to hearing children.
• Poor efforts to challenge the deaf students to gain Higher Education and get like BED degree.
• Poor trust into the abilities of each deaf child.
• Still labeling deaf children as "disabled" like deaf children"can´t".
• Poor preparation for the life after leaving school.
• Poor knowledge about new ideas of teaching deaf children worldwide.

A big problem at all deaf schools is that the majority of teachers is hearing and do not have fluent skills in Sign Language and do have a poor trust in the abilities of each child that each deaf child can achieve the same like a hearing child. Another problem is the lack of knowledge of Deaf Culture. As long as hearing people are the majority at deaf schools with having poor awareness about Sign Language and Deaf Culture, deaf schools will continue to fail in educating deaf children equally to hearing children. It is each deaf child´s Human Right to get a proper education like it is stated in the UN Standard Rules.

How can this huge amount of problems be solved ? Therefore, I would like to make at first some few suggestions:

• teachers must work on themselves to be able to trust that each deaf child can make the same achievement as hearing children.
• using the same curriculum as hearing children.
• more activities in classroom to let the children experiment and solve problem by themselves.
• support to give them a good opinion and critic skill.
• being open minded for new ideas that are discussed in the Deaf Education fields like Bilingual Education and have a look also for new developments in other countries.
• organizing Sign Language courses.
• using Sign Language from pre-school to High School level.
• organizing workshops leaded by Deaf adults to learn about their way of life and about their own school experiences in order to avoid to have the same problems.
• inviting Deaf adults with Sign Language skills to the deaf schools to teach Sign Language to the deaf children and to read stories from children books to them etc.

The list of suggestions for solving the problems could be continued but hopefully that these are a start to think about all the problems and how to solve them step by step.

There are still some more issues I would like to address: To my impression deaf schools that are located within one city do not collaborate together.

I find this sad because such a collaboration and exchange would help all to develop better schools for deaf children. It is highly recommended that, for example, principals and teachers get together like every two months to share their experiences working with the deaf children and, thus, work more closely together. At the same time such a collaboration would also be a big benefit to the deaf children to get together with other deaf children from other deaf schools in the same city.

Another issue is that those deaf schools who support Sign Language use different Sign Languages: there are deaf schools (Bangalore and Ooty, Tamil Nadu) who sign in ASL (American Sign Language), other use ISL (Indian Sign Language) and other again in Tamil Language. I was especially somehow irritated that these deaf schools in Bangalore and as well in Ooty use ASL but this is the American Sign Language. I rather would have chosen ISL - the Indian Sign Language to keep the native own Sign Language. I think, ASL can be learned as a first foreign Sign Language to be able to communicate with deaf people on an international level. The Rehabilitation Council in New Delhi along with deaf people like Murali Kuppusamy may want to have a closer look on it and start to discuss which Sign Language should be used. I would have preferred the Indian Sign Language. This matter will be left for the Indian Deaf Community to discuss and decide - maybe along with the support of the Sign Language Resource Center in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu.

My last issue is to talk about hiring deaf teachers. It is a hearty delight for me - being a deaf teacher by myself - to know that there are several deaf schools having deaf teachers. I admire and applause that. But having a close eye on them, most of these deaf teachers do not have a formal education for becoming a professional teacher. They just teach like Sports, Sewing and such classes. And yet, it is a great start with having them at the deaf schools. They must be strongly encouraged and supported by the hearing staff that they should play a bigger role at the schools since they are deaf themselves. The teaching staff should strengthen their potential to go on to be a more positive role model to the deaf children. A good start would be like to allow them to teach Sign Language to the deaf children - especially at the pre-school age. They also can stand as counselor to the deaf children to encourage them to go for Higher Education as they missed it untill now. Those deaf children being taught by these deaf teachers will be the deaf people of the future Indian Deaf Community as they will for sure be able to develop a much stronger positive personality and self-esteem so that they go for Higher Education. They then will return to the deaf schools as professional deaf teachers.

This is something to think about. At last, here it must be loudly announced throughout the world that the Indian Deaf Community provides the first professional deaf teacher with the BED degree. Just at the end of our tour we found the first professional deaf teacher in Bangalore. It is Shri. M.N. Srinivas at the Sheila Kothavala Institute for the Deaf. What a hearty jumping - especially for me. The school he is working for must be highly supported to continue to educate deaf children equally to hearing children. These children are very lucky to have him as a role model to look up. The Rehabilitation Council may want to take the opportunity to work with him to improve the quality of teaching deaf children in the whole country India.

If India wants to make sure that life of deaf children must be improved, the first step to be done must be the improvement of the educational system at all deaf schools in the country. That means to follow the UN Standard Rules on Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities and the Salamanca Statement as shown at the beginning of this report. To be able to fulfill these Rules, working along with WFD (World Federation of the Deaf) will be for sure very supportive on this international level. Given the permission of using the Sign Language in classroom equally to the spoken language, regarding the education of deaf children, for sure, there will be considerable changes from the "low level" towards "high level". Here, it must be clarified that the Deaf Community never demanded to abandon spoken language out from the schools. What is demanded is to add Sign Language as an equal language next to the spoken language in classroom. That means both languages should be taught to deaf children. The Sign Language as a basic language, spoken language as far as it is possible for each deaf child to acquisit. This is one of the philosophies of Bilingual Education.

Hiring and accepting deaf teachers as equal colleagues among the hearing teachers at deaf schools also will have a big positive impact on teaching the deaf children in India. If this can let be happen, the Indian Deaf Community for sure will catch up the big gap between Europe and even the USA and will be able to lead a good quality life for all deaf people from young to old. Otherwise the deaf children in India will be lost among the 80 % of the worlds deaf people population according to the WFD.

India also should keep in mind that not only India is still farback behind with the proper education towards deaf people. Many other countries are in the same boat, even my country for some aspects, too. Very important is that the attitude of having a will for positive changes to give a better life for deaf people is filling the room. To make this true, the best way to teach deaf children is to teach them bilingually like many countries practice, for example, Russia, Japan, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway, Ireland, and several other European countries, USA, Canada, Australia, Columbia, Venezuela and others. The oppression of deaf children must definitely be stopped. Oralism/Audism has failed educating deaf children for sure, and this must be realized and accepted especially among the hearing teachers/ principals at deaf schools but also among the parents and family members of each deaf child.