33. Deaf children were sent to deaf schools at a very young age on a day or boarding basis on the advice of educators, medical and health professionals, and due to lack of support for education and communication at home and at mainstream schools. Audist societal attitudes meant parents of Deaf children were told that an institution was the best place for their children, so they could be taught to adapt to the hearing world.

34. This chapter describes the circumstances that led children and young people being taken or placed at Van Asch College (Van Asch) and Kelston School for the Deaf (Kelston) during the Inquiry period.

Experience of being diagnosed Deaf

35. A child is presumed to be born with the capacity to hear until there is an indication of hearing loss, which is usually diagnosed by a medical professional. Some children sent to the deaf schools were born Deaf. This could have been due to several factors, including, for example, their mothers contracting rubella during pregnancy or genetic factors. Other children became Deaf due to childhood illnesses.

36. Most Deaf children had hearing parents who may not have initially realised their children were Deaf. In some cases when a child had previously been hearing, a parent may have thought the child’s lack of response to speech was simply being naughty. Māori survivor Whiti Ronaki (Te Arawa), who was at Kelston from 1959 to 1969, said:

“I was born hearing but when I was 3, I got the meningitis and lost my hearing … When I lost my hearing, I used to get hit and yelled at. [My adoptive parents] thought I was being cheeky, but I was Deaf.”[31]

37. Official diagnosis was often delayed for years. NZ European survivor Ms JR said: “I was not diagnosed with a hearing impairment until I was 8 years old … Soon after I started school … my teacher rang my mother and said, ‘what the fuck are you doing about your daughter’s hearing?’ This was very strong language for the time. My mother burst into tears and explained that she had been trying to get the doctors at Wellington Hospital to help her for three years, but no one listened to her. She was labelled as a neurotic mother. The doctors refused to see us ... Wellington Hospital finally agreed to give me a proper assessment. I was diagnosed with severe hearing loss.”[32]

Lack of support for children and whānau to communicate at home

38. The dominant education mode for Deaf children was oral education until 1979. Parents generally did not have the knowledge to teach their children to lipread or speak, and were not offered the option to use Sign Language. When a child reached school age, families were told to enforce strict oralism. NZ European survivor Mr JS said: “A specialist confirmed I was Deaf when I was 9 months old [in 1965] … My mother found this difficult to cope with. No one in my family used Sign Language. At the hospital, my mother had asked the doctors how to communicate with me and someone who looked like a nun said that she should only ever speak to me, and signing was bad. My mother believed what the experts told her. She mainly communicated with me by drawing pictures.”[33]

39. Parents’ inability to communicate with their children contributed to some being sent away to school at a very young age. NZ European survivor Mr JT said: “I was born profoundly Deaf … My early childhood was pleasant. My family communicated with me orally and with lipreading ... it was hard work communicating with my family. I remember I had to ask them to repeat things all the time and I was often dismissed because we could not understand each other. I was sent to Kelston School for the Deaf when I was 4 years old [as a boarder].”[34]

40. Some families and whānau developed their own way of communicating with their Deaf child. Māori survivor Mr LF (Ngāti Maniapoto) was the only Deaf member of his immediate family, and although he found it difficult to communicate, he was able to disclose physical abuse at Kelston to his mother, who contacted the school.[35] Maliah Turu (Te Whānau a Apanui, Ngāti Pūkenga Manaia, Whakatōhea) described how her family initially made up their own “home signs” which came “naturally” to communicate with her Deaf brother.[36]

Advice from educators, medical and health professionals

41. Education was compulsory for all children from 5 years old. Educators and medical and health professionals, who were predominately Pākehā and hearing, advised family and whānau across Aotearoa New Zealand to send their children to deaf schools. They were sent to board in Ōtautahi, Christchurch or Tāmaki Makaurau, Auckland.[37] Māori survivor Milton Reedy (Ngāti Porou) said: “At the age of 5, on a doctor’s recommendation, my parents decided to send me to Kelston. My siblings were not sent to boarding school. Kelston told my parents only to speak to me in English, so unfortunately te reo was never passed on to me.”[38]

Pathway from mainstream and other schools

42. A lack of support at mainstream schools often led to Deaf children failing at school, being bullied by hearing children and punished by teachers for not understanding oral teaching. Some mainstream schools had Deaf units within the school, which provided some support for Deaf children. However, the parents of many Deaf children were encouraged to move their families to be close to the deaf schools and enrol them as day children or send them to board.

43. NZ European survivor Mr JS, who went to many different schools, said:

“I experienced mainstream education, Deaf units within mainstream schools and Deaf Schools … I spent three years altogether in mainstream schooling and it put me so far behind. It was really bad. I was always told off for getting my school work wrong. It was a disaster. I became violent from all the frustration.”[39]

Lack of support to educate children at home

44. Professionals advised families and whānau to send Deaf children away to deaf schools as there was no assistance to raise and educate them at home, or any consideration given to establishing Māori organisations to provide tāngata Turi Māori education and care at home. The absence of children and tamariki from home impacted the whole family or whānau. Māori survivor Maliah Turu (Te Whānau a Apanui, Ngāti Pūkenga Manaia, Whakatōhea), whose brother went to Van Asch, said: “Back then, the doctors said that there was no help for the parents, so they had to send kids to deaf school. However, for us as Māori whānau at home waiting for my brother to come back, it was heartbreaking.”[40]

Children from the Pacific Islands

45. From 1962, some Deaf children were brought from the Pacific Islands to be educated at Kelston.[41] In 1974, Kelston Principal Darcy Dale questioned this practice – the children were from a very different background and in most cases had been learning to lipread in their own native language. He suggested a better solution might be to have a trained teacher to educate the children at home. [42]

Footnotes