Tressa's College Experience

Tressa was very young when first she became pregnant. Her first child was named Lyn Alan, but unfortunately, he passed away. She became pregnant again at 19 with Sug and had Alandra. Tressa was already exposed to a deaf child, since Sug’s cousin’s family had a daughter, Joy, who was born deaf. From this interaction, Tressa already had some ideas of how deaf children act. When Alandra was only five months old, Tressa had some reason to think that she was deaf, “I don’t even remember what made me suspicious,” (page 10). Three-day -measles correlated with deafness, but it was early in her pregnancy so it was not a definite cause. Tressa also tested Alandra’s hearing by how she reacted with opening candy wrappers, but always “passed” them. …show more content…
She was placed into preparatory classes that bored her. She said they were too easy and then decided to drop out. Tressa also had little education, and knew that earning a college degree would help her daughter be successful. Although Alandra dropped out, she did get a job at the post office.
Her college experience was very short lived so it is very different from mine. I do agree that easy classes can make a student want to drop out, but students should be thankful for easy classes. I have been in college for over a year and a half so I have experienced a lot more than what she did. I wonder if Alandra had made more friends or made stronger connections with others, maybe she would have stayed and finished her degree. Alandra’s mother became more involved in the deaf community. When she was first exposed to other deaf adults, she often left before they could come up to her and sign. She was self conscious with her signing skills. At the end, she realized that since she did try to become proficient in sign language, she was not completely left out of Alandra’s life like the rest of her family. Tressa became more accepting of her signing abilities and where she belonged in the deaf