Educating Deaf Students There are several different ways for a deaf or hard of hearing child to learn in the education system. Often, these are divided into two general categories of “residential” and “mainstream.” They all have many positive and negative aspects that every parent of a deaf/hard of hearing child must weigh heavily before deciding where to send their child for the best education. Residential schools used to be the most common among deaf students. Most of the time, they are boarding schools that teach anything from pre-k to 12th grade. Students live at the school, and learn among a community of only deaf and hard of hearing students. Recently, however, the boarding schools have been falling out of favor, as more parents prefer schools that do not have students live on campus. Until recently, many schools actually banned the use of sign language on campus. This prompted students to teach signs to each other in secret, and thereby continue spreading deaf culture. Now, however, most residential schools allow sign language, or even teach in sign. These schools are designed specifically with deaf and hard of hearing students in mind. Much of the staff is normally deaf, and students are able to easily communicate with their classmates, often for the first time in their lives. These students have deaf adult role models, which can be difficult to find in a hearing world. Students easily absorb and pass on deaf culture, and develop better ASL. However, these students can find it more difficult to interact with their hearing peers, and many parents complain that the education standards at residential schools are not as high as in mainstream schools. As residential schools fall out of favor, more and more parents are sending their children to residential schools. Residential schools normally teach deaf or hard of hearing students in one of three different ways. If the school is a “total” mainstreaming school, students go to all the same classes as hearing students, but they will have an interpreter or note taker in the class, or they will take speech therapy. “Partial” mainstream schools have students take their core classes with specially trained teachers of the deaf and only take extracurricular with hearing students. Another option with partial schools have students go to mostly hearing classes and meet with a teacher of the deaf a few times a week. The third option is “team teaching,” where a regular teacher and a trained teacher of the deaf work together in the classroom. This is the