First time in Georgia, vocational education for deaf people is provided on sign language with the sign language translator. Today, in the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia, the specialists have summed up the works conducted for the development of academic sign language. At the same time, there was a presentation of the website SignWiki. The website is designed for deaf people, their parents, sign language teachers and translators. The Minister Tamar Sanikidze opened the meeting which was attended by teachers, sign language translators, deaf people and representatives of NGOs.
Since 2013, the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia, by the support of the Ministry of Education and Research of Norway, has been implementing a project called “Establishing inclusive education in Georgian vocational education and training system”. The aim of this initiative is to increase accessibility of vocational education for the persons with special educational requirements and limited abilities and to provide learning process in compliance for their individual abilities, interests and requirements.
It is a priority for the ministry to ensure quality of the learning process for the persons with special educational needs. Promotion of learning process is conducted in accordance with the individual needs of each student. Deaf persons are actively involved in the vocational educational facilities. Vocational education is being taught for them on the sign language with the help of sign translators. Vocational examination process is specially organized by taking into consideration the individual needs of deaf students. As a result 53 deaf people have received vocational education since 2013.
Since 2013, the Ministry of Education and Science of Georgia, by the support of the Ministry of Education and Research of Norway laid the foundation for the development of academic sign language in vocational education, because there are few signs that can provide full translation in the process of vocational education. Since 2013:
- Georgian signs regarding vocational education programs have been identified, registered and spread for the potential users in 15 different professions.
- It is notable that while developing Georgian bank of signs, the Ministry of Education and Science employed 75 deaf persons with the active co-operation of deaf persons union.
- By the support of the Norway, in order to gather, register, record and spread the signs, the Georgian electronic program of signs’ registration has been created – it is similar to SignWiki. Georgian was granted to the access to this website.
In 6 months there were 2748 signs uploaded on the website, which were gathered and video taped by the deaf people for the determined 15 professions. Simultaneously with the working groups, in order to spread SignWiki for potential users, the informational meetings with the target groups were conducted,
The Ministry of Education and Science plans to fill the website with various educational resources for deaf people. They will also start to gather and post signs required for school subjects, so the information will be available for deaf students from the earlier stage.