The new ASL club at RMHS is committed to continuing the education of American Sign Language within the school community.
The ASL program at RMHS was chartered between the 2023-2024 and 2025-2026 school years. After being taught by a teacher hired by the SEEM collaborative in the 2024-2025 school year, the class changed its structure for the second year to Dual-Enrollment. An Endicott College professor taught the class for students, where they did many video and vocabulary projects. Unfortunately, the program did not have the staffing to continue in future years.
While ASL will no longer be taught at the high school, students still have the opportunity to learn the language through a new club established this year. Grace Betcher (’28), alongside Leah Henneberry (’28) co-founded the ASL club: a group dedicated to learning American Sign Language, as well as the importance of Deaf culture and history.
Both Henneberry and Betcher are students in this year’s ASL class and felt that it was important to continue some form of ASL within the school community. Betcher mentioned the idea to Henneberry, and they quickly founded the club. Ms. Lee, a Spanish teacher at RMHS, is the club adviser.
Henneberry and Betcher are excited about what the club will be able to accomplish in the future. Betcher said, “My long-term goal is for the club to help create a more inclusive RMHS for people that are deaf or hard of hearing.”
In addition, they discussed how they’re happy they get to continue ASL even after the program at the school has ended. Henneberry said, “I love learning the language and wanted to make a space where others can take part in learning too. Some people who didn’t have a chance to take the class have expressed interest in learning ASL so I was excited to make a place where they can learn too.”
In the long term, both Henneberry and Betcher hope that the skills they teach members of the club will help to create a more inclusive Reading overall.
Meetings are biweekly on Thursday mornings at 8 am. The club welcomes those who are new to ASL as well as those who have more experience with it. The group’s Remind can be found at @rmhs-asl.
