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Former student helps behind the scenes with Galludet protests
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WASHINGTON (Map, News) - Brian Riley, 44, of Fresno, Calif., worked behind the scenes to help organize the demonstrations that led to Sunday’s firing of incoming president Jane Fernandes. Riley, who can hear, was a student before the 1988 protests that led to the removal of the school’s president. He now owns a math tutoring business.
What's your background? When did you attend? What are you doing now?
I studied computer science but became so interested in the linguistics of American Sign Language that I enrolled in grad school at Gallaudet in 1985.
As a student, I felt a deep sense of injustice as to how the students were being treated. I was involved in an attempt in 1987 to force the administration to accept American Sign Language as the primary language. I participated in that 1988 “Deaf President Now” protest and felt deeply inspired by it.
What was your involvement in the latest demonstrations?
I played the role of the “cut-out man.” Because I was hearing, I could take risks and stir up controversy. If my efforts backfired, I could be “cut out” of the protest, and deaf people could disavow any relationship with me.
Ironically, I was always closest to the scene when I was at home in California and communicating with protesters on the Internet via their pocket pagers. When President Jordan unjustly forced me off campus Oct. 19, I went back home and did more effective work.
The key moment came when the protest leadership [Ryan Commerson, Tawny Holmes, Erin Moran and others] sent the protesters to the gate to be arrested. We knew President I. King Jordan committed political suicide the moment the arrests began and that eventually we would win.
This is the second time that demonstrations have led to the ouster of school president. Is this the best way to select the school's steward?
It’s certainly not the best way. People have put their lives at risk. The reason this had to be done is that Congress simply has not been monitoring the trustee members and the administration.
What’s going to happen next? Are the demonstrators going to be involved in the selection process?
You better believe that they are going to want a seat at the table during the next selection process, and they deserve to be there. All stakeholders deserve to play a role.
– Scott McCabe
