After 5 years of going to school at Idaho State University, Robert has earned his Doctor of Education in Higher Education Leadership. He successfully defended his dissertation July 29th. His research consisted of interviewing 12 department chairs of foreign language regarding their views of ASL being an equivalent language to other languages. He interviewed 6 from institutions that accept ASL as an equal and 6 from institutions that do not accept ASL as an equal. Interestingly 11 of the 12 administrators did not accept ASL as an equivalent language regardless of institutional policy. The argument that ASL should be treated as equal to other languages is very controversial among departments of foreign languages in higher education. Even his committee at the defense argued among themselves regarding it classification.
Whats next for Robert? He will make his children call him Dr. Dad, he has plans to remodel the lighting in the kitchen, repair the swing set, sew a jean quilt, start to learn the violin, travel to San Francisco/Sacramento, travel to Washington DC, and all his spare time will be spent with the kids being a stay at home dad for a time.
