Adam Szulc – aszul@ukw.edu.pl
Bartłomiej Niespodziński – barnie@ukw.edu.pl
Faculty of Health Sciences and Physical Education
Kazimierz Wielki University

In the years 2020-2023, the Department of Health Scientific and Physical Education of the Kazimierz Wielki University implemented the grant "Including the community of deaf athletes in academic education and academic sports".
The project was implemented in cooperation with the Polish Deaf Sport Association, the Academic Sports Association and was financed by the Ministry of Education and Science.
The completion of the project coincided with the celebration of the 100th anniversary of the Polish Deaf Sports Movement and with historic medal results during the XXIV Summer Deaflympics Games in Caxias do Sul in Brazil, where Polish deaf athletes won 42 medals.
The project included educational and research trips to sports clubs for the deaf and to training camps of national teams of the Polish Deaf Sport Association.
During educational workshops, the benefits of belonging to the Academic Sports Association were presented: sports scholarships, participation in national and international competitions

Project goals

1. Assessment of the educational needs of deaf athletes in Poland,
2. Identifying problems limiting the participation of deaf athletes in higher education,
3. Presenting the possibilities of combining studies with training within the Academic Sports Association,
4. Assessment of the sports level of deaf athletes in relation to the results achieved by hearing athletes in various sports disciplines.

At the project attention was paid to modern forms of training, based on scientific research, the use of which may contribute to improving the sports level of deaf athletes: proprioception training, explosive strength, etc.

Selected survey results

Are you a student or graduated?

In the survey conducted, 68% of adult respondents did not participate in higher education. The largest group were people with profound hearing loss.

Do you think that studying is a waste of time?

20% of respondents said that studying is a waste of time and is unnecessary.

3% of people who completed studies said that they did not need studies.

Will you go to university after high school?

50% of young people aged 15-19 would like to study after high school. It is a good trend for the development of sports in Poland.

Does your family encourage you to study?

32% of parents encouraged their deaf children to study, and as many as 69% of parents did not encourage their deaf children to study after graduating from high school.
There is too little awareness among parents of the benefits of studying for the best deaf players.
Continuing higher education requires integration with the hearing community.
The small number of deaf people entering university may be influenced by the fact that 62% of respondents have been treated badly because of their hearing loss, and over half of respondents admit that they have trouble meeting new people.

Selected results of sports research

Polish female aged 14 to under 18 took part in the study. They were: 8 deaf female football players (national team of the Polish Deaf Sports Association) and 16 hearing female football players (women's premier league and women's second league).
The arithmetic mean and standard deviation of the age of the individual groups were as follows: deaf football players 16.13±1.25 years and hearing football players 16.41±1.23 years.
Deaf female footbal players had a training experience of 6.43±3.10 years, while the training experience of hearing female football players was 4.63±2.47 years.
The body height of deaf and hearing female football players was 165.6±4.52 cm and 165.8±4.2 cm, and their body weight was 59.11±10.41 kg and 58.56±5.83 kg.
In the case of total muscle tissue mass, the following values were determined: 45.67±5.87 kg for deaf football players and 45.44±4.22 kg for hearing football players.
Hearing female football players had a lower level of total body fat, which was 19.53±3.92%, while deaf female football players had 22.1±4.83% of body fat.
In terms of body height, body weight and segmental analysis of body, there were no statistically significant differences between the groups.
The female football players also participated in a 35 m running speed test. The hearing football players achieved a time of 5.601±0.226 s, and the deaf football players 5.853±0.156 s. These differences were not statistically significant.
The relative value of lower limb power in the vertical jump (CMJ) was 33.11±11.16 W/kg in the case of deaf football players and 24.61±3.70 W/kg.
The higher value of power in the lower limbs of deaf football players did not correspond to a higher value of jump height. Hearing football players jumped higher than deaf football players, and it was: 0.34±0.03 m and 0.31±0.02 m, respectively. There were no statistically significant differences in any case.

Summary

The implementation of the project allowed for the identification of the educational needs of deaf athletes, as well as potential limitations in this area.
The project increased the awareness of the deaf and hard of hearing regarding the benefits of participating in higher education, including various forms of academic sports.
The conducted research showed that deaf female football players have similar sports potential to their hearing peers.
In the near future, analyzes of all data collected in the project will be carried out for basketball players, volleyball players, sailors and players from sports clubs for the deaf.

Translation of text into PJM in video format: