‘Met the challenge:’ Deaf Susquehanna Township girls basketball player finding success on all-hearing teams – pennlive.com

Stephanie Shipi doesn’t hear the game of basketball the way everyone else does.
Not the sound of the whistle. Not the squeak of shoes on hardwood, the percussive boom of ball colliding with floor, the swish of the net or the chatter that is common among teammates during a play.
The Susquehanna Township junior is deaf, and while that might affect her perception of the game, those around her in the Indians program say it certainly isn’t slowing her development as a player.
Shipi, who started to lose her hearing around five months old when a high fever damaged the nerves in her ear, can hear whistles and dribbling, thanks to cochlear implants, but even with those in, the sound of the game remains different. Without them, the sounds blur together and she depends on teammates to let her know when the play is over.
That hasn’t stopped Shipi, who splits her time between JV and varsity, from making an impact on the court. Indians JV coach Tamaura Woodson said that she’s aggressive on defense, and that if Shipi is told to guard 25, “she’s guarding 25 until 25 is sitting down, taking a drink of water.”
“I love that about her, but she’s not too comfortable with offense. We always are trying to get her to score the ball,” Woodson said. “Offensively, at practice, she makes all the shots. I wish she would take them in the game.”
Playing on an all-hearing team, she requires signs to be made for her on the sideline to help call plays and let her know what is going on, along with the help of an interpreter, Laurey Walker, who is with her on the bench and sideline during games and practices wearing a face shield.
“I was curious what it was like to be involved in a hearing team and I thought it would be a challenge because they’re all hearing and I’m deaf so I joined the team and it was really different,” Shipi told PennLive through Walker. “They’re all talking to each other and I communicate with sign language so it was like opposite kinds of communication, but I went ahead and met the challenge.”
Shipi has played basketball at Susquehanna Township since seventh grade and has steadily come along as a player. She looked up to her dad, who imparted his love of the game onto her, and she began to gain interest in the sport, watching the NBA and WNBA while in middle school.
She decided she wanted to take on the challenge of joining an all-hearing team at the school. As expected with picking up a new sport, it took her some time to learn the sport and to gain confidence in it. Shipi said when she would first get the ball in games, she would immediately pass it.
“Now I have a little more confidence like I don’t have to throw the ball right away, but that is still something that I’m developing,” Shipi said. “My coaches try to tell me, ‘You have to be confident in yourself.’ They encourage me and want me to think positive and I’m like, ‘Thank you. Thank you, that makes me feel good.’”
Susquehanna Township athletic director Victoria Ivey said the school has had several deaf or hard-of-hearing athletes over the years.
Walker, who works for the Capital Area Intermediate Unit, said the educational service houses its high school classes at Susquehanna Township and that any deaf students with CAIU attend the classroom. Walker said she has frequently been the interpreter for student-athletes interested in participating in sports at the school and that she has worked in just about every sport except golf.
“Kids are always pretty accepting and they’re so used to having our students in the high school, which I think is helpful,” Walker said. “It’s definitely a learning experience on both ends for both the deaf student and the hearing student, but hopefully it’s a positive thing for both of them.”
That learning experience has required coaches and the hearing student-athletes on the team to make adjustments over the years. Walker is almost always with Shipi during practices and can help interpret what is being discussed, and during games, she sits on the bench and will translate what Woodson is telling the team.
It’s easier to convey play designs and changes in the game during timeouts when the team is all gathered together, but when Woodson decides to shift things up during the game, the team has to pass a sign for whatever play is coming up to make sure Shipi is on the same page.
The communication barrier has not prevented her from contributing to discussions during practice. During film sessions, Woodson said she will ask the team to break down a play, and Shipi is eager to share what she sees in the film.
“‘What do you notice? What just happened here?’ Nobody wants to answer it,” Woodson said. “She’ll chime in with an answer. That’s very positive and she keeps the team focused and moving on.”
There are still areas where communication can be more of an issue. Shipi said that she often feels isolated being the only deaf person and that there is a camaraderie with the others because they’re hearing students.
She said her teammates do make the attempts to include her, however, and that there are some who know a little bit of sign language.
“Even just knowing a little bit, just very basic things is the sign for play. ‘Do you want to play?’ I’m like, ‘Yeah.’ That makes me feel included when anybody knows even just basic signs,” Shipi said.
But, as it’s done for virtually everything, the coronavirus has changed the system.
In the past, everyone would sign the plays on the court. Instead this year, since the team hasn’t been able to spend as much time together off the court, the responsibility falls on the point guard. Woodson said Shipi will often help come up with the sign for certain plays that start with either red or black and then are followed by a number.
“Then we started putting in more plays that had just traditional names and her interpreter was running out of signs, so we just started asking Steph, ‘What do you want us to call it?’ And she came up with the signs for it,” Woodson said. “The point guard came up with a sign for one of the plays before we even thought about it because Steph wasn’t in practice at that time, she was on the side and she was like, ‘Let’s call it this for Steph.’”
The coronavirus pandemic has forced other changes for which Shipi and the team had to adapt. In years past, Shipi would lip-read well enough and Walker would interpret anything said with relative ease. Shipi said she can hear the sounds, but she doesn’t know what the words are that are being said.
Often, the solution has been to text or to write something down. Everyone will have either paper or their phone with them, and they’ll communicate by writing or typing it out.
“The reality is it does make it a little more difficult because everyone’s face is covered now,” Ivey said. “So where she could probably read your lips previously to be engaged in the conversation, it does take her out of that conversation a little bit.”
The masks have also made Walker’s job more complicated. American Sign Language relies on facial expressions for conveying adjectival language, Walker said, and since Shipi is forced to wear a mask, Walker misses that component of language.
Before the season began, Ivey worked to at least make it easier for Shipi. Ivey received approval from the PIAA and all the Mid-Penn athletic directors at schools that they would be facing that Walker could wear a face shield instead of a face mask to help Shipi understand what is being said. Walker is allowed to wear the shield during the games when she is asked to interpret what’s going on, so long as when the game is over and they’re switching to varsity or she is not being asked to interpret that she wear a face mask.
“I do struggle with the masks because it’s really difficult for communication, but you know, you’ve got to deal with it,” Shipi said. “I do always have an interpreter so they can let me know what’s being said, and I’m really, really grateful for the interpreter.”
On Feb. 12, 2020, Woodson took Shipi and the team to go see Penn State Harrisburg take on Gallaudet University, a private university for deaf and hard of hearing students. They got to watch as the Bison took down the Lions 67-62 and Shipi got to go into the locker room to visit the team.
Woodson said it was fulfilling getting to see a team that is hard of hearing or deaf and knowing that if Shipi wants to pursue basketball, there are schools where she can do it and where it won’t be just an accommodation, but rather the environment.
“I saw a spark in her when she got to visit and know that there are opportunities where her communication barrier won’t affect her play,” Woodson said.
For now though, Shipi is enjoying getting to play the sport at Susquehanna Township. She takes pride in sending photos of herself playing to her dad and hearing the excitement that comes from him in getting to know that she is competing on a school team.
“He shows all his friends like, ‘Look, this is my daughter playing basketball,’ so you know he’s kind of bragging about it a little bit,’” Shipi said through Walker. “‘Yeah that’s my girl. That’s my daughter.’ I kinda laugh about it, but I’m happy that my dad’s been able to see me through this and he’s always been so supportive.”