The members of the Model School for the Deaf Project are grateful to all who have helped with the project: To those who have written to the Minister of Education to recommend departmental acceptance and funding; principally, Inger Ahlgren, Britta Hansen, Mary McAleese, and Johan Wisemann of the World Federation of the Deaf European branch. To Bernadette Burns for taking on the task of training deaf teachers for the project. To Michael Smurfit, Dublin Round Table, the ABB Group, Irish Life Assurance Co. L. M. Ericsson, the Irish Deaf Society, the Irish Deaf Women's Group, Maeve Binchy and Superquinn for generously providing funds. To the Dublin Deaf Association for making space available in the Deaf Club for extra-curriculum activities.

Thanks to Shawn Mahshie for her tireless efforts in her six months stay in Dublin, helping us in lobbying to get the option of bilingual education for the deaf and Irish Sign Language enshrined in the Education Bill, She also read the drafts of the handbook and made many suggestions for its development.. To David Little of Trinity College, Dublin for facilitating us for the seminar. To Peter Soden for his legal advise. To John Cooney and the Sunday Tribune for his feature on the launch of Breaking the Silence with the heading 'LET THE DEAF TEACH THEMSELVES'. To Jacki Bourke and Andy Polack of the Irish Times for bringing our project to a wider audience. To Allison McDuff for transcribing the seminar talks. To Dawn Duffin, Deidre Dunne, Lucy Moran, Ellen and Des Smyth, Pat McDonnell and Pat Matthews. who each contributed their time and talents to the cause. To James Mahshie for his lectures to speech therapists in Trinity College, Dublin on the relationship of Sign Language and speech in the education of the deaf. To Jill Steer of Educate Together and Tomas O Baoill of Gaelscoileanna for their expertise learned in setting up the independent multi-denominational and Irish language schools, respectively, for guiding us through the maze of legal and bureaucratic pitfalls. To Seamus Clandillon for bringing the staff of the two Cabra schools for the deaf together for a talk on the bilingual system by Shawn Mahshie.

Brian Crean,
Project Manager,
Model School for the Deaf Project.