Outlaw officials claim sign language for 3-year-old’s name looks like a gun.
GRAND ISLAND, Nebraska (PNN) - August 29, 2012 - Deaf 3-year-old Hunter Spanjer of Nebraska signs his first name with a gesture resembling a gun, and his parents say his school wants him to stop. Fascist school officials say they haven't asked any deaf students to change how they sign their names.
The preschooler's father, Brian Spanjer, took to Facebook Sunday to garner support to allow his son to continue using the S.E.E. (Signing Exact English) symbol at the Early Learning Center he began attending last week. The Facebook page had more than 5,300 likes by early Wednesday.
Hunter has used the name sign since he was 6 months old, when the school district started working with him, said Janet Logue, Hunter's grandmother.
The name combines the symbol for the letter h for hunt, the thumb down along index and middle fingers extended together and waved, with the letter r, crossing the two fingers, Logue explained.
“Hunter is confused” at school now, where teachers are spelling his name out to him, said Logue.
Spanjer posted a letter from the American Civil Liberties Union, citing legal cases and telling the Grand Island Public Schools it’s wrong and "politely asking (it) to rethink (its) position".
Brian Spanjer has vowed to fight until his son gets to keep his name sign.
He said he's shielding Hunter from the attention his dispute with the school district is generating. "I am shocked this is an issue," said Spanjer. "As a parent you never think anyone would take issue with your child's name. When someone is named Christian, people don’t automatically go to religion."
"I want to make sure this doesn’t happen to any other deaf child or special needs child," added Spanjer.
The policy of Grand Island schools, located about 145 miles west of Omaha, forbids students "to knowingly and voluntarily possess, handle, transmit or use any instrument in school, on school grounds or at school functions that is a firearm, weapon, or looks like a weapon."
Claiming privacy rules as the reason, a school spokesman refused to address the Spanjers' complaint.
"Grand Island Public Schools has not changed the sign language name of any student, nor is it requiring any student to change how his or her name is signed," district spokesman Jack Sheard said in a prepared statement. "The school district teaches American Sign Language ("ASL") for students with hearing impairments. ASL is recommended by the Nebraska Department of Education and is widely used in the (Fascist Police States of Amerika). The sign language techniques taught in the school district are consistent with the standards of the Nebraska Department of Education and ASL."
Brian Spanjer said he doesn't have any issue with Hunter learning ASL too, but he hopes to have an S.E.E. interpreter for his son. He said he prefers S.E.E.'s exact language approach to signing over ASL's.
