Ano DAW?

No one is as deaf as the man who will not listen. — Jewish proverb

Like most everybody, deaf people want to be heard. The annual celebration of the Deaf Awareness Week (DAW) becomes the symbolic loud gong to get everyone’s attention on the important issues faced by the deaf people and the need to bridge the gap between the hearing and the deaf.

“This is an event where we want to encourage hearing individuals to join because this is for them to understand deaf people more. We’d like to put the message across that, look, this disability is not a problem,” says Carolyn Ui, principal of the host school for this year’s DAW event, Miriam College-Southeast Asian Institute for the Deaf (MC-SAID).

On Nov. 9-15, the different members of the Metro Manila Federation of Agencies for the Deaf (MMFAD) — a 35-member organization composed of public and private schools for the deaf, and government and welfare agencies — will come together for one of the country’s biggest events for deaf people.

It will open with an advocacy run on Nov. 9, starting from the Quezon City Memorial Circle to the grounds of Miriam College, where day-long activities will be held. The advocacy run will be simultaneous with that of Cebu’s and other provinces around the country which will also open their local DAW celebration.

The activities lined up made sure it stayed true to this year’s theme: “Ano DAW? Deaf Ako, Walang Hadlang!” There will be sports and fun games, and a fashion show, among other activities, with both deaf and hearing participants. Ultimately, the goal of the activities is to demonstrate that a barrier only exists between the worlds of the deaf and the hearing if we allow it to.

Ui, who is also the vice president of MMFAD, explains that these activities are the federation’s way of telling the public that deaf individuals are as capable as hearing persons and can blend well with them in any activity. “Unless you make the public aware of who deaf people are, what they are capable of doing, you can’t do anything for them.”

Throughout the week at Miriam College, activities are lined up such as film showing, symposium on auditory-verbal therapy, and a concert of classical music featuring the Oktokanto Guitar Ensemble and songs interpreted by deaf children.

At the University of Sto.Tomas and in selected malls, hearing tests will be conducted free to the public. Ui says there are many people who have some degree of hearing loss but don’t know it and the free hearing tests may help them detect it earlier.

The event will culminate with a dance concert to showcase the limitless possibilities for deaf children. It will be held at the Amoranto Theatre where public school deaf students will perform with the Quezon City Performing Arts in a show dubbed “Apaw DAW sa Sayaw.”

Statistics show that there is a total of 121,598 Filipinos who are totally deaf, partially deaf or hard of hearing. The number, however, could be higher, says Ui who has been working with the deaf through the academe for 18 years now.

She says that the challenge has always been opening more avenues for deaf people to help them realize their full potentials. One of the pressing issues is to get companies to be more open to hiring deaf people.

Under the Magna Carta for Disabled Persons (Republic Act 7277), Section 5 states, “No disabled person shall be denied access to opportunities for suitable employment.” It further reads, “Five percent of all casual, emergency, and contractual positions in the Departments of Social Welfare and Development, Health, Education, Culture and Sports, and other government agencies, offices or corporations engaged in social and development shall be reserved for disabled persons.”

It is one of DAW’s goals to call the attention of companies to include deaf people in some of their corporate social responsibilities (CSR) programs as a start.

Ultimately, activities like DAW becomes a shout out to the bigger issues deaf people all over the country are dealing with. “We would like to remove the impression that because a person has a disability, hangang diyan na lang siya.” 

Ui also says that hopefully through the event, MMFAD will be able to expand its membership and convince other agencies and companies as well to be involved “so participation in events like this will increase.”

For the DAW schedule of activities, log on to www.mc.edu.ph or call Carol Ui at 925-07257 or 09178970712.