Deaf-Blind Rehabilitation Teacher Uses Disability Experience to Help Others

Deaf-blind Specialist Jeri Cooper communicates by placing her hands beneath a deaf-blind client's hands as she uses sign language and finger spells. Cooper works for Visual Services in the Oklahoma Department of Rehabilitation services.

People with vision and hearing loss can use a tactile form of sign language to communicate.

Deaf-blind Specialist Jeri Cooper communicates by placing her hands beneath a deaf-blind client's hands as she uses sign language and finger spells. Cooper works for Visual Services in the Oklahoma Department of Rehabilitation services.

OKLAHOMA CITY − A proclamation by Gov. Brad Henry declared June 27 through July 3 Helen Keller Deaf-Blind Awareness Week in honor of the well-known American author and lecturer who was deaf and blind.

Like Helen Keller, Jeri Cooper from Tulsa is deaf-blind. Since February she has traveled the state to help others as the newest deaf-blind specialist for Visuals Services in the Department of Rehabilitation Services. For many years, Cooper was a student at DRS’ School for the Blind in Muskogee and then a Visual Services’ client. Working at the agency is her dream job.

As an infant, Cooper did not respond well to light and sound. Doctors recommended that her mother Norma Lynn put her in a residential facility.

“My mom had a lot of faith in God and just wouldn’t do that,” Cooper, a slim, perky blonde, explained in a clear, soft voice. “Mom said you don’t know what someone is able to do until you put in the time to help them reach their goal.”

In Cooper’s line of work, time really is the point. Because of vast differences in vision and hearing losses, each client’s equipment and services must be adapted specifically for that person. The specialists then teach each person to use the features they need. This is a process that just can’t be rushed.


People with vision and hearing loss can use a tactile form of sign language to communicate.
In addition to evaluation, counseling and guidance, Visual Services staff offer adaptive technology, education, vocational rehabilitation, communication assistance, mobility training and job placement. The agency also provides information, referral and advocacy and may provide job coaches who help clients with work-related issues. Assistance is available to Oklahomans with all types of disabilities that are barriers to employment.


Last Wednesday morning, Cooper and DRS’ other deaf-blind specialist, Joan Blake, teamed up in eastern Oklahoma City to replace a defective device and help a client test drive new equipment intended to help her communicate by phone.

The equipment was a Teletypewriter (TTY), also called a Telecommunication Device for the Deaf (TDD), with a keyboard used to type messages to others with the same equipment or operators who translate messages by voice or video transmission.

To communicate, the client placed her hands lightly on top of the others’ hands so they can use sign language and finger spell. When she wanted to talk, the hands swapped places.

Text from the client’s previous TTY had become garbled, but she was familiar with its adaptations for deaf-blindness, including a screen that scrolls large text. Even after Cooper and Blake made adjustments, the largest text on the new screen was too small. They considered using a magnifying glass. They tested incoming calls placed from the same room. The group then marked the keyboard with plastic, stick-on dots to orient the client to the keyboard by touch. After two hours, the client led the group in deciding that this TTY was not the best option for her.

While they were a little disappointed, no one was surprised. They are familiar with test-driving and experimenting with equipment until it works for the client. It’s just part of the job.

They agreed to try a TTY that can output phone messages in Braille during the next visit because the client is studying Braille and making good progress with Cooper’s help. In addition, Cooper said she has ordered a new Closed Circuit Television that the client will use to enlarge and read text at home and a portable CCTV she can use to read restaurant menus and labels in her cabinet.

Cooper herself has just started using a TTY with Braille features. While she is totally blind, her hearing aids are strong enough that she can use a regular telephone. She must use the TTY, however, to contact clients. Her sign language and finger spelling expertise began 13 years ago with a desire to communicate with a deaf friend.

Visual Services helped Jeri Cooper earn degrees at Rogers State University and Northeastern Oklahoma State University. She completed a Master’s of Arts in Rehabilitation Teaching for the Blind at the University of Arkansas at Little Rock on May 14. In the fall she will test for a Vision Rehabilitation Therapist certification and is currently taking an online course through Northern Illinois University to be certified in deaf-blind rehabilitation.

“Every day I pinch myself and thank God for this job,” Cooper said. “This is where I should have been a long time ago, except that back then, I would have been too helpful. I’m at the point now where I can help people help themselves so they can learn to be independent.

“That’s what Visual Services did for me,” she said smiling. “I am someone that taxpayers have helped, so that now I’m able to give back and repay the money they invested in me. It’s because of my mom that I can be a testament to not giving up – to tell other people to have faith in themselves that they can do it too.”

In 2010, the national Deaf-Blind Awareness Week theme focuses on the critical role of Support Service Providers (SSPs), a new type of support person who provides visual and environmental information that helps deaf-blind individuals find out about their environments and make informed decisions.

SSPs are not currently available in Oklahoma, but Jeri Cooper and Joan Blake plan to change that. In the middle of Deaf-Blind Awareness Week, they will meet with Hope Crumley, DRS’ Services to the Deaf and Hard of Hearing program manager, to develop the first SSP program in the state.

“SSP's are important players in the full independence of people who are deaf-blind, allowing them to work, shop, attend social events and be part of the community,” DRS Director Michael O’Brien, Ed.D. said. “The work that Jeri, Joan and Hope are doing to set up an SSP program in Oklahoma will make a positive difference in the lives of people with vision and hearing loss.”

For more information about employment services for Oklahomans who are deaf-blind, contact Joan Blake at (405) 522-3417 or email jblake@okdrs.gov. Jeri Cooper is available at 918-551-4921, TTY 918-551-4933 or jcooper@okdrs.gov to help those who want to be more independent at home or have homemaking as an employment goal.

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