[Please note that this written version of Ki'tay's eulogy does not reflect some of the spontaneous additions made during its presentation. Other notes:  Immediately prior to presenting this eulogy, I opened by centering the space by sharing Ki’tay’s name sign (*heart touch with the eight finger*) that was given by a Deaf individual & asking participants to collectively uplift names/name signs of those who are no longer physically with us. I also acknowledged that I would be switching between tenses because I had not quite figured out this whole thing.]

Saturday, December 13, 2014
Orland Park, Illinois
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What an incredible honor.

I am so very humbled, grateful and honored to be counted among those who know and love Ki’tay D. Davidson. My name is Talila A. Lewis--sign name and chosen name, TL. Ki’tay is my life partner, my mentee, my mentor, my dearest friend, and the one who showed me precisely what the meaning of love is.

It is solely because of Ki’tay that the theme of this day & of the rest of my eternity is: Love Wins.  

We come together today, not only to celebrate the life & legacy of a beautiful human being who embodied everything that active love is, but also to learn about those who may come from different communities & yet be just as human as you--to learn how to affirm, love and fight with and for them.  In doing so, we will love ourselves more deeply and move the world faster toward collective justice & liberation--the world that Ki’tay dreamed of and fought for with all of his being and all of his heart.

There is a quote by the poet Rumi that reminds me deeply of Ki’tay & helps me understand precisely how many of us feel in this moment about his loss. It’s a question and an answer--which is how most who truly knew him remember Ki’tay: Dialogue. Interdependence centered always.

​The quote is as follows:

"My heart is so small . . . it's almost invisible.  How can you place such big sorrows in it?"
"Look," he answered, " your eyes are even smaller, yet they behold the world." 

Ki’tay was a lot of things to a lot of people, organizations & institutions:

• The voice of affirmation when you weren’t quite sure of your self worth, dignity or beauty.
• The voice of love & justice within institutions & organizations rife with oppression & violence.
• The voice of his unique brand of Black Trans Disabled innovation when all others were frozen with fear or frozen in traditions, religion or ritual.

While Ki’tay’s work, what he stood for, and how he transformed all of these people and entities can never be encapsulated in any language, what we can be sure of is that they will forever be changed for the better because of his existence and sacrifice.

Many here may have met Ki’tay but aren’t familiar with who he is or what he stood for. Allow me to share a bit about him with you:

Ki’tay  is  a Revolutionary dreamer, leader and lover.  One who prized people, prioritized love & propelled action by empowering all.  

Last year, for example he was awarded a prestigious White House award, honoring his contributions as a “Champion of Change” for his transformative advocacy & activism with and for multiply-marginalized people with disabilities.  Upon being named the Champion of Change, he penned an open letter to the community saying this, in part:

I challenge the extent to which we place the responsibility for advocacy on those designated as leaders or “champions.”  Advocacy is not just a task for charismatic individuals or high profile community organizers.  Advocacy is for all of us; advocacy is a way of life. It is a natural response to the injustices and inequality in the world.  While you and I may not have sole responsibility for these inequities that does not alter its reality. 

Today I am thankful.  I am thankful for every ally and individual working, struggling and fighting to make this world a better place--thankful to any and everybody who realizes that this world is bigger than themselves, and who channels that awareness to “level the playing field.” These are people who can acknowledge their privilege and opportunity, and consciously and intentionally use their existence to transform communities...I may have earned a prestigious award, but today it is not really about me.  It is about the community and I am simply a singular representative of thousands of people who give their hearts and their time to living a life of transformation. Thank you to all the champions who came before me, to those I have met, and to those who I have yet to meet.  Thanks to those champions who have encouraged, listened, affirmed, fought and loved, alongside our beautiful community.  Together, we have made change and will continue to make change.  There are many chains that need to be broken. We all know it.  I support you and welcome you to hold me accountable as we hold all of ourselves accountable to facilitating inclusive and loving environments for all.

These are what I have come to call Ki’tay’s truths.

Ki’tay found innovative ways to speak to injustice in many different contexts—from racism, transphobia, ableism, to discrimination against incarcerated persons and people with a history of incarceration.  Indeed, he possessed courage of his convictions.  It could be said; and it is true, that many people possess this trait.  

However, it was Ki'tay's ability to sit with and actively love oppressors and those who were violent toward him and marginalized communities—most often solely because they do not adhere to  that which has been deemed “normal”—that truly set him apart.  He could breathe life and love into even those people within mere moments of making their acquaintance. This is what makes him special—reminiscent of what some here may call a prophet; others, a wise man; others still, a light or sage.  

He was grounded in love. Always.

Ki’tay did not feign to know all of the answers to the problems of the world, but he prided himself on always learning and evolving to address injustices. Those who know him will tell you that rarely a day went by that he was not researching and sending research to others on issues that most of us could not even begin to understand.  When confused about the content, we were not chided or insulted for not knowing, but affirmed for our interest and ability to challenge ourselves.  He could explain the most abstract and nuanced concepts with elegance and pith such that all you could do was smile and shake your head after having struggled for days--sometimes weeks--to digest the content.  

This was Ki’tay’s love language. Community-centered learning, growth, activism and healing.

He was frequently caught quoting the famed Assata Shakur:

It is our duty to fight. It is our duty to win. We must love each other and protect each other. We have nothing to lose but our chains.

He has understood since, well, birth it seems [Ki'tay's mother had just shared some stories about his struggles for justice as a toddler and young child], that we can not remain silent about injustice against any group of people, be they black, disabled, indigenous, gender nonconforming, trans, homeless, sex workers, incarcerated persons, and the list continues.  He understood that each individual group’s liberation was inextricably linked to the other--that justice & liberation could only be had if we all stand together and fight for the rights and liberties of the next individual or community.  He understood that we are free when we use our freedom to advance the rights of all members of our community; or as Nelson Mandela put it, “to be free is not just casting off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.”

It was his visceral yearning for universal equality, solidarity & collective activism that explains Ki’tay's immense joy with the recent collective creation of #DisabilitySolidarity with Allie Cannington and myself. Disability Solidarity has been the impetus behind groups fighting for disability justice to dedicate themselves to racial justice and for non disability civil rights organizations to dedicate themselves to disability justice.

On October 17th, I sent Ki’tay an email for which he expressed sincere gratitude. The short email was a quote from the Dalai Lama, who, when asked what surprised him most about humanity, said this:

Man surprises me most about humanity.
Because he sacrifices his health in order to make money.
Then he sacrifices money to recuperate his health.
And then he is so anxious about the future that he does not enjoy the present;
the result being that he does not live in the present or the future;
he lives as if he is never going to die,
and then dies having never really lived.

One thing Ki’tay did do was live fully. Another was consciously ignore the vanity that pervades our culture.  He found the beauty in everything natural. He valued all people regardless of gender, color, creed, disability, sexual orientation, religious or spiritual bent (or lack thereof), or gender identity.  He found & created beauty where it could not be found and shared this beauty and love with all who would listen—and with those who thought they were not interested, but had no idea.

See, many of you here are familiar with parables and stories of grace and justice that you studied and learned from holy books.  I however, was fortunate to witness parables and actions of grace and justice because Ki’tay lived them.

Solidarity for Ki’tay means active resistance to the status quo--letting ALL people know that they are respected, cherished, valued & LOVED. Solidarity also means letting them know that despite our failures, we are committed to their cause because it is inextricably linked to each of our individual and collective causes.  Ki’tay believed that the time is now to seek what is just.
​
Ki’tay did more in twenty-two years than many can complete in several lifetimes. If he were here right now witnessing for and sharing with all of you in light of all that has occurred even over these past several days, I believe his heart would share this modified message from Martin Luther King, Jr.:

Now let us begin. Now let us rededicate ourselves to the long and bitter, but beautiful, struggle for a new world. This is the calling of my generation and those who are in the generations to come--who wait eagerly for your response. Will you say to us that the odds are too great? Will you tell us the struggle is too hard? Will your message to us be that the forces of life militate against our arrival as full persons, and that you send your deepest regrets? Or will there be another message—of longing, of hope, of solidarity with our yearnings, of commitment to our causes, whatever the cost? The choice is yours, and though we might prefer it otherwise, we must choose in this crucial moment of human history.

In closing, I wish to offer you, a call to love & a call of action.  

Here is our call to love. This, from the great Paulo Coelho:

​In those moments, love appears and says: 'You think you're heading toward a specific point, but the whole justification for the goal's existence lies in your love for it. Rest a little, but as soon as you can, get up and carry on. Because ever since your goal found out that you were traveling toward it, it has been running to meet you.

And now, our call to action--again from the late great Martin Luther King, Jr.:

Human progress is neither automatic nor inevitable. . . .Every step towards the goal of justice requires sacrifice, suffering, and struggle; the tireless exertions and passionate concern of dedicated individuals. 

Thank you Ki’tay for consciously sharing your love with us.
Thank you Ki'tay for your countless quiet sacrifices in the name of love, liberation, humanity.
I wholeheartedly recognize and am forever humbled in knowing that you are the mightiest of all our miracles.

May we ever uplift, share and act out your truth: Love Wins.

Today the FCC voted to reduced predatory phone rates and ban abusive hidden fees on calls from jails and prisons beginning early next year. This is critical for incarcerated individuals and their loved ones--including at least 2.7 million children who have incarcerated parents. This historic order ends decades of abuse by huge private prison telephone companies that make millions by charging excessive rates to families who want to maintain contact with their incarcerated loved ones. This is also a huge victory for prison phone justice advocates who have fought for over a decade to end these excessive rates. Deaf and disabled people affected by mass incarceration, however, are not so fortunate.

Three years ago, I launched HEARD’s Deaf Prisoner Phone Justice Campaign to gain support for deaf and disabled people who have been denied access to telecommunications in our jails and prisons for decades. Despite the fact that deaf and disabled people have the least access to legal counsel and programs and services within our jails and prisons; and despite the fact that they are most targeted for physical and sexual abuse in prisons nationwide, they have the least access to telecommunications on the inside. Countless deaf incarcerated people have gone for years without telecommunication access.

To be clear, HEARD is an all-volunteer organization. I am a volunteer with a full-time job. No one who has supported this effort earns income from this advocacy. I cannot speak for others, but I started and continue this Campaign because I dream of one day living in a space where all people are treated with love, decency & dignity. I dream of “one day” being now. Right now. This very moment. We need not wait.

This vote represented an opportunity for our government to right a long-standing, egregious and deadly wrong.

Instead, I have again witnessed the government acknowledge the abuse, neglect and isolation; pat me on the back for reminding them of the existence of this violence; then look away—each federal agency excusing its own inaction by pointing to its own alleged “lack of authority” to make this right.

Their inaction has only emboldened those who are more concerned about profits than people. As a direct result, my communities are needlessly suffering and dying. Indeed, after three years of fighting for free phones (sounds ridiculous right?!?), I have come to the conclusion that our government is very comfortable perpetuating violence against the most vulnerable among us.

I apologize in advance for the disjointed nature of this post, but I need so badly to share these thoughts. Here is a brief look into the sacrifices that incarcerated people, family members of incarcerated individuals, advocates and attorneys have made; some of the lessons I have learned; ire for those who claim to represent deaf/disabled people who actually contributed to this injustice; and sincere gratitude to those who have supported my communities by practicing accountable advocacy during this heartbreaking journey.

CHOICES: LAW SCHOOL VS. LITERAL LIFE

I had just completed my fifth & final law school exam of the semester. It was a few hours before midnight on December 20, 2013, and the Federal Communications Commission’s midnight deadline was fast approaching. I had not even begun drafting HEARD’s comment. Most of my fellow phone justice advocates had submitted their comments hours earlier. As a full-time law student who doubled as the volunteer director of an organization serving hundreds of deaf and CODA incarcerated people (and their loved ones), early comment submission was a far-off dream.

This would be my fourth extensive comment to the FCC in less than a year explaining abuse and exploitation of deaf and disabled prisoners which necessitated telecommunications access and exposing prison telephone companies who continued to charge loved ones, legal counsel and advocates of deaf incarcerated individuals excessive rates for practically no communication.

Exhausted, I cried and cried. Then I cried some more.

I did not cry because I had just completed my fifth grueling law school exam—ending early despite desperately needing more time to work on it (this would end up being my lowest law school grade and I am still upset about that)—and wanted more than anything for my mind, eyes & body to rest;

I did not cry because I was being asked to find more ways to say exactly the same thing as I had in my previous three comments;

I did not cry because it seemed as though each FCC deadline always landed on the worst of days & my peers were taking one to three less courses than me notwithstanding all the work that I was voluntarily undertaking (the injustice of their internships counting as credits while my running an entire organization counted for none...);

I did not cry because a national deaf/disability organization took an interview with a national news outlet attempting to discuss deaf in prison issues mere days before the FCC vote but did not so much as mention this critically important issue or HEARD’s ongoing pathbreaking volunteer advocacy;

Nor did I cry because the disability rights and deaf rights communities continuously failed to even show up for our incarcerated community members whilst HEARD volunteers did all of the heavy lifting.

I cried because I knew that even as I sat and wrote this comment, that deaf people in prisons across the nation were becoming depressed, going insane, and attempting & completing suicide because our government was failing to ensure that they had equal access to something as basic as communication.

How else could I call injustice, injustice?

My partner, gave me much-needed space to grieve and release, then helped still and steel me for the task ahead. I worked for at least another six hours straight. 

While all of my peers were off enjoying the “holidays” and the end of our penultimate semester of law school, I could not rest. I sat in the mock courtroom of my law school with tears streaming down my face, exhausted beyond measure, and I dictated and typed, typed and dictated--faster than I’d ever done before. I was deathly afraid that I would not be able to submit a comment by  the deadline, so I worked on this comment as if there was no tomorrow--remembering that for many in my community this could very well be true if I did not find the right words.

I had to find the words that would move those who had the power to change this.  

MY WORDS & THEIR TORTURE ARE APPARENTLY NOT ENOUGH

Today we post the final part of our response to the Daily Dot article. Please read Part One & Part Two of this three-part series if you have not already.  Please join our next Twitter chat on December 8th at 7:30 p.m. EST, where we discuss "Deaf Education in the Age of Mass Incarceration."  

Here are our final responses which includes our perspectives on the impact of the #DeafEd Movement, some of our goals for the Movement, and our thoughts on why people should continue to care about & join this Movement.

Q5: Do you feel that you are currently reaching those goals?

MICAH: As for myself, I think it's always going to be a journey to self-analyze and improve/adjust in how to best advocate or provide resources for other students. #DeafEd has helped me in this, in that I have gained a better understanding of my rights to education while I'm still in college as well as how my upbringing plays a significant role in my perspective of life.
In general #DeafEd is taking steps in the right direction, as a tool for anyone and everyone involved to be able to gather and share resources and ideas.

HEIDI: I do. Like I said previously, each month is inconsistent in participation. However, we are getting more new people joining our conversations. Even a few college professors are having their classes tweet and even joining the chat! I don't think we will ever reach the goal because we will never reach every person we hope to reach, but the more awareness of #DeafEd we bring each day, ultimately the more lives of children we are impacting.

TL: We are constantly working toward those goals and many others.

Education is a journey, not a destination—a practice, not a test score, grade, or lecture. #DeafEd is where you learn all of this and so much more. This will be a life-long effort for all involved.

Q6: What next steps would you like to see?

MICAH: I would love to see #DeafEd continue, and continue witnessing teachers/professionals/parents adapt to better suit the current students' needs.
Seeing more people host these chats and what new topics they bring up would be greatly beneficial, because there may be topics or perspectives that I still am not yet aware of.

HEIDI: As a group, we feel it is time to pass the torch on to others who can move #DeafEd forward. We hope to find someone who can enhance what we have started and bring fresh perspectives and ways of attracting more people to Twitter and the chat.

LAUREN: While the #DeafEd movement is still a new concept to many, it is a critical platform to disseminate information on current trends in Deaf Education, and to have an open dialogue on issues in a field that is seemingly controversial to many due to varying perspectives. This platform is one way to tear down walls, and to connect educators throughout the world. Often times, teachers of the Deaf are isolated due to the low incidence population, so coming together for a monthly chat, helps to bridge all of us together and share resources.

TL: I would like to see how we can connect with people who may not have access to the internet or linguistic, economic, or other privileges to be able to effectively participate in these sorts of dialogues. We have done well to ensure that this space is as accessible as possible. I would like to see the physical version of current virtual #DeafEd chats established in communities in accessible spaces and languages.

I also would like to see Youth serve as consultants to administrators and educators in schools and universities across the nation. This should be standard practice.

Q7: Why should readers care about #DeafEd?

LAUREN: Our voices as teachers must not be silent.  We must work with the system that has been handed down by those who think they know best for our Deaf students. We may be teachers, but we are also leaders. It is how we raise our voice that matters, not our titles. We do not need a certain position of power to reverse injustices. We know deep down what is best for our students and we cannot be afraid to promote it. We must teach our students to be advocates of their own lives, because if they do not advocate for themselves, they will not be able to navigate their way in this world.  #DeafEd is an opportunity to advocate for our students, and to spread awareness on what defines #DeafEd.

MICAH: Access to education plays a significant role in how far people are able to go, as well as how aware they become of their rights.

Students with disabilities are more likely to be suspended (even more so if the student is a person of color) and sucked into the School to Prison Pipeline, a major contributor to #DeafinPrison (another area that I am getting more involved in, as an intern for Helping Educate to Advance the Rights of the Deaf).

Schools will hold high expectations for "normal" behavior even when the school environment is "abnormal" for the student theirself. As such the student is often set up for failure then due to lack of education, lack of awareness of their rights (due to not having education on this), and the frustrations of being in a world that is not set up for their needs, their culture, their language & tools (whether this is ASL, tactile sign language, cueing, etc).

Almost every person knows someone who was "that kid" in school; problematic, lashing out, aggressive, and/or needing extra attention from the teachers. But have they really taken the time to consider why that is, or whether the negative perceptions of "that kid" are coming from a place of ignorance?

#DeafEd is a great starting point, in getting to learn from actively-engaged advocates of #DeafEd, and the DDBBHH students that are affected, because we are the ones that ARE the source. There is a serious issue of people who need "proof" of how education impacts DDBDDHH students in the form of written research by multi-privileged academic peers, rather than believing marginalized people's stories in the first place. Please note this is common in all areas of injustice, especially racism and ableism.

In conclusion, there needs to be a deliberate inclusion of DDBDDHH people into education to ensure competency amongst everyone as this is an area that often serves as a gateway in/out of prison and/or a better, safer life.

TL:  #DeafEd is where we move toward freedom and liberation in education & society.
​
I have participated in numerous education-centric chats. There are many things that set #DeafEd apart from others. The one that I want to name here is the fact that #DeafEd centers perspectives from multiply-marginalized DDBDDHH Youth like Micah (@MicahzLewis), Alex (@AVHadvocacy ), Tina (@TinaxBanerjee ) and Cortez (@csh7893), just to name a few. This is exceptional—though it absolutely should not be. Perhaps #DeafEd will start a trend in ed chats where we center the voices of those whose education, lives and future are at stake.

Today we post part two of our response to the Daily Dot article. Please read Part One of this three-part series if you have not already.

Q2: Explain some general problems in Deaf Education that readers might not be aware of (i.e. graduations rates, etc). If you had to pick a few, which issues would you like to be highlighted?

LAUREN: Currently, 86% of the Deaf population are being mainstreamed into public schools, trying to make it through the education system, labeled “Deaf education”, or would it be more appropriately called surviving a ‘hearing’ education? Are our deaf students learning about Deaf role models? About important contributions made to society by Deaf people? The landscape of Deaf education has changed dramatically over the years. We now have laws and expectations that now focus on student outcomes rather than student access and growth. In addition, Deaf students are being assimilated into environments that are defined by hearing policy-makers and so-called educational experts as the least restrictive environment (LRE) otherwise known as ‘inclusion.’ We know that the LRE ideology is actually exclusive rather than inclusive. In addition, many of our students come from diverse cultural and linguistic backgrounds. So what exactly defines Deaf education? No longer should we be just focusing on providing direct instruction, derived largely from curricula designated for hearing monolingual students. We must become culturally responsive teachers and to help to raise the voices of not only our students but also ourselves as leaders in Deaf education.  We need to be dynamic community teachers in order to model for our students how to reach their full potential, and to empower them to become life-long advocates.  As a teacher in a marginalized community, we cannot remain hidden in our classrooms. We cannot teach in isolation. We must be community teachers, and this is why #DeafEd is important.

MICAH: In general, there are still the issues of audism, ableism, and racism in Deaf Education.
For example: Regarding racism, Black American Sign Language is often not acknowledged or taken into account when speaking about variations in ASL. Plus, if someone asks to imagine a Deaf student, the majority of the time one will immediately think of a white person.

With ableism, there's the fact that if a student is Deaf+, resources often are not available for both identities at the same time (ex: DeafBlind students not having access because accessibility would be either hearing-based or vision-based). If there is a mental health issue or a cognitive disability, that is often pushed under the rug or used as further proof that Deaf people are "violent."

For audism, this is often seen when one finds out why a certain person may have decided to be a professional in Deaf Education, or the systemic goals behind certain schools of thoughts such as teachers pitying the DDBDDHH students or helping "for" the Deaf (rather than actually working "with" the Deaf). Audism plays the main role in why oralism is very much a strong influence of Deaf Education, as professionals claim that learning sign language or gestures would only be detrimental to language acquisition (contradictory to studies that show children who learn ASL often pick up on a larger vocabulary faster).

TL: The problems in Deaf Education by in large are problems with the larger more amorphous system we call "education”—and to a much greater degree, problems with society writ large. The fact that we have cemented into the minds and hearts of even the youngest among us that there is a "normal"—that some ways of listening, behaving, communicating, thinking, learning are superior to others—is, in fact, a serious problem. The fact that sign languages are not seen as viable teaching languages that would be a value-added to all students is a terrible shame for all of our students and indicative of ableism and audism in society and education. Similarly, the fact education outcomes for students of color; students who are income, food and housing insecure; LGBTQI students; and students with disabilities indicate an urgent need for transformation of how we allocate resources, support marginalized communities and serve all of our students.

I once had the privilege of serving as an educator to middle school-age students in a low-income neighborhood in Washington, D.C. Though these students happened to be hearing, they connected with course content provided in American Sign Language in ways that they could not when provided in spoken or written English. Sign language was a gift that provided another way of understanding the world and concepts that otherwise may have been missed.

Sadly, our continued insistence on use of subjective measurements of  “success,” and our collective failure to ensure that education universally accessible and culturally responsive, leads to students being pushed out of school and into the prison system. Studies indicate that 85% of the youth presently incarcerated in our nation’s prisons have at least one disability.

As an activist working to end mass incarceration and the attendant school to prison pipeline, #DeafEd serves as another way of raising consciousness about the importance of an intersectional framework for education that shifts the educational paradigm from rugged independence to compulsory interdependence; from zero tolerance to nonviolent & restorative justice principles; from race & disability “neutral” to race and disability positive & responsive. This framework centers trauma-informed education, disability justice, and universal access to undermine the root causes of the school to prison pipeline. Not surprisingly, this approach also brings about uncommon success in all students because it centers the whole humanity of your youth, supporting them to each become their best selves.

TAMARA: Growing up, I had always felt like an outsider.  I was “between worlds”.  I am biracial and grew up with a mix of Norwegian and African-American cultures.  I weave between the Deaf and Hearing worlds.  So often society forces us to “choose” a side.  I see this often with my high school students who are struggling to figure out who they are.  Those of us in the education field need to become better advocates for intersectionality.  We need teachers and administrators who are willing to unpack their privilege and help students question the world around them.  Too often people navigate FOR deaf students.  Our students, regardless of disability, need to be able to form their own opinions, develop their own beliefs, and build their own character.  

Another issue is the unintentional segregation that often affects students of color.  Too often we are seeing students of color relegated to remedial cohorts and rarely are they visible in honors level classes or even student council positions.  We are also seeing a drastic need for more teachers and administrators of color.   We have to have a serious conversation on what diversity means and how we can combat some of the disparities we are seeing within our schools.

Q4: How would you describe the DeafEd movement currently in your own words? What are the ultimate goals?

TL: #DeafEd means different things for and to different people. Even among our current core team, you will receive vastly different responses to this question. That is the beauty of #DeafEd. The hashtag and the movement—is dynamic and can serve in whatever capacity anyone so chooses. It also changes with time and innovation.

People have used it for networking, professional development, sharing space, debating, being heard, live tweeting education conferences, and much more.

Some of my ultimate goals for #DeafEd include:

• Help to reenvision “education”;
• Center the perspectives of those who know best—DDBDDHH Youth and adults;
• Illustrate the importance of love-infused, trauma-informed, race/culture-responsive education; and
• End the school to prison pipeline.

MICAH: Monumental. A crucial piece in the movement for accessibility, intersectionality, and for decreasing the marginalization of the DDBDDHH communities. For me, I believe the ultimate goals to be:
-improvement of education standards and accessibility for DDBDDHH students
-wider variety of teaching methods, as there is no one template
-greater involvement of students (because whatever education choices made will impact them directly) as well as the guardians (because learning happens in the home too). This is necessary for teachers and other professionals as well, in that they take the time to listen to feedback and advice due to the fact that many are white, able-bodied, hearing people who do not share the same experience as their students.

TAMARA: To me, the #DeafEd Movement is a platform for open dialogue.  The history of deaf education has been one rife with division as well-intentioned people try to answer the question of What is the best way to educate deaf children? Or how do Deaf children learn?  The answers to these questions are as diverse as the people who are a part of the Deaf Community.  I think with #DeafEd, we are creating a safe space for people to share ideas and resources, connect with others in our field, and develop some common ground to show that we are all dedicated to providing our students with the best educational opportunities possible.  The ultimate goal for me would be for educators to feel more open in sharing what works—creating a space that allows us to absolve geographical lines, absolve the “us” vs “them” divisiveness that so often permeates social media, and become a source of true professional development.   I think we are getting there.  I’d definitely love to see a larger participation that included more students, administrators, policy makers, professionals, and even educators from around the world.  I’d like to see our movement lead to real positive change for our students.  

HEIDI: I think more people are aware of #DeafEd and use it as they navigate or participate on Twitter. When we changed the schedule for this year's chats (which started in August), people were messaging me asking when the chat was. It is great to know we have people who expect the chat to happen and need the chat to happen. My goals for the chat are to bring teachers closer together. Because the majority of deaf and hard of hearing students are being served in their local school districts and represent a very small percentage of the student population, Teachers of the Deaf are often isolated from their colleagues. They cannot just walk down the hall to ask another Teacher of the Deaf a question. #DeafEd is a way of eliminating that isolation, of getting global perspectives on deaf education.

However, I think there are still too many teachers, parents, community members, etc who are uncomfortable with the platform which hinders the ability to expand as much as we want. HEARD has created ASL videos on Twitter basics to encourage more to participate. I think if there was this type of chat platform on FaceBook, where everyone is comfortable, we would have a larger audience each month.
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LAUREN: As teachers in a battlefield of differing ideologies and misconceptions, we must learn to find solutions and educate others what it means to raise a deaf student in the education system. A dream I have is that one day the field of Deaf education will no longer only begin from a hearing, monolingual perspective but rather from a social justice, humanistic perspective. This means acknowledging that we each have the power to utilize our voice and be the voice of others through a variety of mediums such as social media.  And this is why I am vested in #DeafEd.