When the ax fell at Seattle Central Community College this week, one of the programs chosen for elimination was the school's interpreter-training program, which trains people to translate for the deaf.
When the ax fell at Seattle Central Community College this week, one of the programs chosen for elimination was the school’s interpreter-training program, which trains people to translate for the deaf.
Across the state, community colleges are trimming programs to save a combined total of $84 million over the next two years. The money, cut from the community-college budget as part of the Legislature’s efforts to fill a $5.1 billion shortfall, represents an overall cut in state funds of about 12.6 percent.
About 25,000 students are expected to drop out of the community-college system between now and 2013 — either because a program is no longer offered or because fewer class options won’t allow them to select a schedule that enables them to go to school and work at the same time, said Charlie Earl, executive director of the State Board of Community and Technical Colleges (SBCTC). About 330,000 students attend Washington community and technical colleges annually.
Seattle Central Community College President Paul Killpatrick said interpreter training is one of three programs that had a low completion rate, poor track record of job placement and high per-student cost. The two others that will be eliminated are publishing arts, and the film and video program, he said.
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Supporters of the interpreter program say it is more successful than has been portrayed. And, they say, it’s especially upsetting to lose a program that serves the deaf community because Seattle has a concentrated population of deaf and deaf-blind residents. The region has historically done a good job of offering support services to deaf and blind people, they say.
“When the economy gets as bad as it is right now, the first people to get brushed aside are those needing services such as deaf and deaf-blind,” wrote Tamara Moxham, an instructor in the interpreter-training program, by email. “It’s as if society is saying ‘sorry, it’s too expensive for you to be deaf right now, so could you please stop?’ “
Instructor Brenda Aron, who is herself deaf, said through an interpreter that graduates have found plenty of work in the community. “We need interpreters for every aspect of deaf life,” said Aron, who fears she will lose her job when the program is eliminated.
Seattle Central’s program is only one of two such programs in the state; the other, at Spokane Falls Community College, focuses on training interpreters to work in the K-12 system, Aron said.
Seattle Central is cutting $4 million, or 10 percent, of its budget over the next two years, and closing the three programs will save about $1 million, Killpatrick said. The school will spend some of its funding reserves to make up some of the shortfall, and other savings will come from cutting administrative and faculty services.
Students already enrolled in all three of the programs will be able to finish their degrees, but no new students will be accepted, and when all students have graduated, the programs will close. Each of the programs has between 25 and 47 students.
Some other programs being shuttered include a carpentry program at Walla Walla Community College, graphics production and print media at Highline Community College and a paralegal program at Skagit Valley College, said Earl, of the SBCTC.
But, he said, not all closures are due to the state cutbacks; community and technical colleges turn over about 10 percent of their programs a year to respond to changing community needs, he said.
Killpatrick said he didn’t know how many instructor layoffs might result from the program closures. Those eliminations are negotiated as part of the school’s contract with its unions.
Moxham said the interpreter program teaches the neurological process of how to think in two languages at the same time, and how to analyze a message and find an equivalent in the other language. Interpreters work in medicine, the legal system, the workplace and every other place that deaf people go, she said.
“At its heart, we see this as a civil-rights issue,” Moxham said. “Deaf people are a linguistic/cultural minority who have had to fight for their rights for a long time.”
According to 2008 census data, about 262,000 people in Washington state have serious hearing problems, and a little less than half were younger than 65.
She said students in the interpreter-training program give hundreds of extra hours of volunteer interpreter training to people in the community, and also do volunteer work with deaf-blind students who attend classes at Seattle Central.
Killpatrick said one of the reasons why the interpreter program was selected is that students who want to earn national certification as an interpreter will need to have a bachelor’s degree by 2012.
So the school is working on an agreement with Western Oregon State University that would allow Seattle Central graduates to earn their bachelor’s in interpreter training at Western Oregon State through an all-online program the Oregon school is piloting. Seattle Central will continue to offer American Sign Language.
Film and Video communications, which has about 47 students, is being cut because it had a lower completion rate than the state average for professional/technical programs, Killpatrick said. To make the program self-sustaining, tuition would have needed to triple, making Seattle Central’s tuition on a par with some private programs.
Publishing arts, which has about 25 students, is also on the chopping block because it has a low completion rate and was expensive to run, Killpatrick said.
The program teaches students both traditional printing skills, such as typography, along with modern techniques, such as electronic publishing.
Katherine Long: 206-464-2219 or klong@seattletimes.com