 Today I had the chance to visit the New Mexico School for the Deaf for the first time. The school is very small, with just over 115 total students from K-12. Its campus, with its size befitting its student body, is designed with the same South-Western architecture as the rest of Santa Fe. We were fortunate to meet with four year Deaf superintendent Ron Stern and I had the pleasure of interviewing him and finding out what NMSD was all about.
New Mexico has approximately 530 Deaf students all over the state, a number that is far fewer than the average. New Mexico, already one of the most lightly populated states with 1.2 million total residents, has come to expect a smaller proportion of Deaf students. This is not a big thing, however, explains Stern when he says that NMSD will never be a large school. “We are better equipped to meet the needs of students here, and the community here at NMSD is like family. Graduations are the most emotional I’ve seen, with many students crying when their friends leave.”
 When I asked about the makeup of faculty members who are Deaf, I got a most stunning response. I found out that practically everyone who taught at the school was Deaf, with just one of six teachers in the elementary program and four of 16 in middle school and high school hearing. This is a percentage that certainly helps the Bilingual-Bicultural philosophy which is applied here at the school, flourish. There is little doubt that you can find total ASL inclusion here. Stern also explained that the school is undergoing heavy renovation and construction, promising an even more beautiful campus in the years to come.
We are fortunate to have a great tour guide at the school, Angie Geffen. She gave us a neat tour regardless of the fact that she had just gotten back from her sister’s graduation in Washington D.C. at 2:30 a.m. that previous night. During our campus tour, the first thing we noticed was that art was everywhere. Wall after wall was covered with student-painted murals, and student art projects were professionally displayed throughout the school. The difference in the art here, and art that I’ve seen in schools elsewhere, is that the art here is actually very good. The usual “the paint is smudged and the boy has seven fingers because our students did it,” was non-existent here. Students who wanted to feel for themselves the complexity of painting the Sistine Chapel, asked their art teacher for a similar project. They soon found themselves on top of scaffolding painting a beautiful mural in the library 12 feet above the ground. The enormous amount of art throughout the school was explained by Hedy Stern, who is responsible for overseeing the library, computer labs, and other student resource center. She explained that art is a huge part of Santa Fe culture, and in a recent poll, Santa Fe was picked as one of the top three most “artsy” cities in America, besting even San Francisco. Others chimed in on Stern’s explanation by adding that art galleries are found on every street in downtown Santa Fe. Students, although many come from poor and broken homes, have an enormous appreciation for art and it plays a huge role in the education of the students here.
 Art teacher Valerie Sedano, who was introduced to us as “THE art teacher,” talked to us about how art is integrated with different subjects. After reading certain books or learning about different time-periods, for instance, Valerie would meet with the class and have them create different works of art that would foster creativity and growth as well as a better understanding of the material. It has been a very successful program and one with fantastic results.
We were then given a tour of the NMSD museum by Adele Ann
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