Victor Galloway, first deaf superintendent of the Texas School for the Deaf, dies
January 17, 2013
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By Asher Price
American-Statesman Staff
Victor Galloway, the first deaf superintendent of the Texas School for the Deaf, died on Wednesday in Austin at the age of 84.
He had suffered from Alzheimer’s disease.
Having already built a career as a distinguished educator, Galloway took the reins of the Texas School for the Deaf in 1981. At the time, the school was in turmoil: The previous superintendent had been accused of not promoting deaf employees and some employees said the school’s staff was inadequately trained in sign language.
Galloway’s appointment “was indicative of the whole empowerment of deaf people that was occurring at that time,” said current superintendent Claire Bugen. “There was the realization they were capable of holding these kinds of executive positions.”
“For the kids it was ‘Wow, here’s somebody just like me in the highest position in my school.’”
Galloway, who was born in Georgia, became deaf following a bout with colitis, an inflammation of the intestines, when he was 10 months old.
Following a career as a chemist at the U.S. Naval Ordnance Laboratory, and for Lockheed Aircraft Corp., he decided to become an educator.
He earned his doctorate from the University of Arizona in educational rehabilitation and educational administration in 1972, and came to Texas after leading a school for the deaf in Pennsylvania.
At the Texas School for the Deaf, he introduced sign language programs for students and their families, including bilingual sign language education for Spanish-speaking families, as part of an effort to break down barriers between the deaf and the hearing.
The hearing, ought to “learn how to communicate (with the deaf) and understand that the deaf are very much like themselves,” Galloway told the Statesman in 1981.
An avid sportsman who had devised his own system of communication with his football and basketball teammates in high school, he also expanded the school’s athletic programs.
In 1984 and ‘85 three houseparents at the school were convicted of sex crimes against students. For failure to report child abuse at the school, Galloway in 1984 was placed on the equivalent of six months’ probation and fined $200. He had pleaded no contest to the charge.
The school’s governing board continued to support him, however.
“If I have any deaf grandchildren, I hope Vic Galloway is still here to teach them,” Avril Thompson, a board member at the time told the Statesman in 1984.
He left the school in 1986 to lead the National Center on Deafness in California.
Galloway is survived by his wife Marilyn, a daughter, and four grandchildren.
SOURCE:
http://www.statesman.com/news/news/victor-galloway-first-deaf-superintendent-of-the-t/nTzd5/
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http://www.kvue.com/news/First-deaf-superintendent-of-Texas-School-for-the-Deaf-dies-187371161.html