The Ceremony of Distributing Certificates to the Participants in the 2019 Egyptian Sign Language Course at the Coptic Orthodox Cultural Center

On Thursday, 28 November 2019, the Coptic Orthodox Cultural Center, headed by His Grace Anba Ermia, General Bishop, celebrated the graduation of a new group of young people interested in working and serving the deaf and hard of hearing. Forty Five trainees were enrolled, with the aim of serving the community.

HG Bishop Ermia distributed certificates to the trainees and pointed out the significant national role they will play for groups that deserve the care and attention of the entire society.

It is worth mentioning that this celebration comes within the activities of the Coptic Orthodox Cultural Center (COCC) to serve the deaf and hard of hearing that number about 5 million Egyptians, according to the latest statistics.

Furthermore, the COCC promotes and fosters the right atmosphere for these groups through the development of systematic educational programs to the deaf and hard of hearing in various fields such as reading and writing Arabic, mathematics, English, etc. to enable students to succeed and excel in their studies. This has given a boost to many of our deaf and hard of hearing children to attend university education.

It is worth mentioning that specialized training courses to teach the Egyptian sign language have been developed in the Center since 2015. To date, more than 218 trainees have graduated; some have become translators for deaf students in university classes.