Council in collaboration with Kenya Institute of Special Education facilitated and participated a graduation of the 363 graduands who successfully completed their six month training in KSL at Kenya Institute of Special Education.
The 363 graduands are part of trainees in KSL that the NCPWD is supporting under the Kenya Sign Language training program in total the Council has so far supported 1087 since the inception of the program in FY 2014/2015.
KSL program targets essential government workers including front office workers community social workers, chiefs, police officers, huduma center personnel’s and other essential public workers. The objective of the program is to equip trainees with basic sign language skills to enhance effective communication to the deaf seeking services in public institutions
Over the years the Council has continued to support government workers enroll in the program through funding to training partnered institutions. In the last five years the Council has invested a total of 47, 565, 000 in the program.
To this end, I wish to inform you that the program has contributed immensely towards improving service delivery to the deaf in public service by ensuring that the graduands are re-deployed in strategic areas to serve the deaf.
A case in point is at the NYS that stopped hiring contractual SLI and now are utilizing a pull of internal capacity of their officers trained in KSL skills.
Other exemplary case worth mentioning is in the Kenya police where constable corporal Kimenchu has initiated trainings to train other officers in basic Kenya sign language as result of this corporal Kimenchu was reorganize with Head of State Commendation by his Excellency president Uhuru Kenyatta.
The Council congratulate all graduands of 2021/2022 KSL training and encourage them to emulate sergeant Kimenchu and other past graduands who have made an impact in service delivery to the deaf in their respective institutions.
As the Council celebrate the graduands of 2021/2022 the Council wish to appeal to various public organization and private sector to support this program so that the number can increase of trainee’s country wide.
The Council call upon government ministries, departments, agencies and county government to sponsor personnel providing essential services for the training. Through this program we shall be able to ensure that the Deaf are able not only to communicate with public servants but also access all public services offered by government. Through this we will be able to enhance the dignity of the deaf who no longer use a third party while communicating to a public servant it will also enhance privacy in communication between the deaf and the public servant.
