Emma Peasgood: Exploring Inclusivity for Deaf children in Finland and Sweden

In 2018, I was very fortunate to be awarded a scholarship from the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust to travel to Finland and Sweden to explore what services were provided for Deaf children.

A Churchill Fellowship is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to expand your professional and personal horizons and, crucially, make a difference to communities and professions across the UK.

Currently, I work as a specialist children’s social worker for the Deaf for the Kent Local Authority and so this is an area of great interest and passion for me.

Why Finland and Sweden?

Sweden was the first country to recognise sign language as the first language of the Deaf in 1981. Swedish Sign Language has been in use since the early 19th century and the first deaf school was founded in 1809 . 

Finland is one of the first countries in the world to have adopted sign language in its constitution (1995). The World Federation of the Deaf is an international non-profit and non-governmental organisation of deaf associations from 133 countries. It’s legal seat is in Helsinki, Finland where the WFD Secretariat operates.

During my time abroad I was able to meet with many different agencies and organisations. Some examples include meeting with Rehabilitation workers for the Deaf in Helsinki hospital, social service directors and support workers in Gothenburg, psychiatrists in Stockholm, the Finnish Association for the Deaf and the Deafblind Centre in Tampere.

I travelled to more rural parts of the country and  was able to participate on a 4 day family course in Raasapori. During my time there, I attended a conference on Deaf children’s rights in Finland and listened to a Speech and Language Therapist’s idea of developing a tool to enable people in her profession to assess Deaf children’s speech and sign more appropriately. 

Many of the professionals I spoke to were really interested in comparing our services and felt that we were lucky to have some dedicated services. I felt that in terms of everyday access, such as the news and Deaf awareness, there was more of a presence in Finland. 

Overall, I found that interpreter access in Finland is more advanced, allowing the service user to have a bank of hours to use with what they so wish to do so. They can use these hours more freely than what Deaf people can in the UK such as for leisure and social activities.

I also found that the provision for CODA’s was at a higher level, particularly in Finland where hearing children can be taught at Deaf schools if they chose to do – so due to sign language being their native language.

In Sweden, parents have access to 240 hours of free sign language provision which is encouraging for Deaf children and their families. To become a qualified interpreter, students have to complete a four year full time degree. The interpreters I spoke to had several challenges of needing to know more than one language both in sign and spoken due to the country’s history. 

However, I did find to my surprise that currently in Finland and Sweden, there are no specialist social workers for Deaf children and there no dedicated mental health provisions for the Deaf. This made me realise that the Sensory team that I work for in Kent and the Deaf CAMHS service are more unique that what I first realised.

Now I am back in the UK, I have been sharing my findings to promote my service in the hope it will generate interest and to encourage other Local Authorities to train social workers to enable them to communicate and understand the needs and challenges that Deaf children regularly face. 

I feel that this opportunity to travel abroad has given me more confidence to promote and celebrate some of the good work that we have achieved as a service in the south of the UK. I am still surprised that there seems to be a myth with the BSL community that Sweden and Finland are very inclusive for the Deaf community and although they have many positives, in my view this is not 100% inaccurate, and they face many of the same challenges as we do in the UK. 

Emma’s full Fellowship report can be accessed here: –https://www.wcmt.org.uk/fellows/reports/exploring-inclusivity-deaf-children-social-care-and-mental-health-services-finland

Emma is a specialist children’s social worker for Deaf and Blind children in the Kent Sensory team. She has worked with Deaf children for 9 years and is severely Deaf.  She has now achieved my level 4 in BSL.