Abeykoon, Tissa

Born in Sri Lanka; being unable to find a job due to Sri Lankan cultural attitudes toward the deaf, lived for 6 years as the only deaf monk in a Catholic monastery there. A meeting with Dorothy Steffanic, a visiting deaf nun and Gallaudet College graduate, led him to come to Gallaudet. He earned his Galladuet AAS degree in 1991, became an American citizen in 1998, and graduated Gallaudet with a B.S. in computer information systems in 2000.