Student Teaches Mansfield Police Sign Language

MANSFIELD, MA — Thanks to one high school student, its going to be a lot easier for Mansfield police to help people who are deaf or suffered some sort of hearing loss. Catherine Fitzgerald, a student studying criminal justice at Southeastern Regional Vocational Technical High School in Easton, spent her semester leading training sessions teaching police officers sign language.

Lt. Roy Bain told Turn to 10 Fitzgerald approached the department to do the sign language training as part of her senior year project. Fitzgerald was passionate about this particular project because she was born with profound hearing loss.

Mansfield Police were more than happy to oblige, as learning sign language gives the entire department an ability to help someone in a situation where it might have been difficult otherwise.

"It's been a privilege to have Mansfield's own Catherine Fitzgerald on loan from Southeastern Regional Vocational Technical High School this semester," Mansfield police said in a Facebook post. "She took it upon herself to create pocket-sized ASL translation guides for our officers and asked to help teach our officers and staff during roll call."

Fitzgerald's next step towards her criminal justice career will be attending Curry College in the fall.