Juti currently teaches American Sign Language and Interpreting at local community colleges, she feels that education is an enormous part of becoming a highly skilled and qualified professional interpreter.

Juti was born in the Deep South to two Deaf parents, Alfred H. Lee, born in Canada and Willie Mae Cremen Lee born in Little Rock, Arkansas. She spent most of her adolescent summers growing up and learning about the similarities and differences among Deaf people in Arkansas and Texas. When she moved North, she lived in Washington, Oregon, Wyoming and visited family in Canada. She finally settled in California at the age of 14, where she has lived ever since.

As a child born in 1949, and growing up in the 1950’s, she learned to communicate in sign language with and for her Deaf parents. At this time, there were no blackberries, sidekicks, closed captioning, video relay, flashing doorbells, Deaf Ear Dogs, or phones with flashing lights to alert them someone was trying to contact them. During the 40’s, 50’s, 60’s and 70’s it was very common for children of Deaf parents (CODA’s) to communicate between them and people the hearing world. She was frequently called upon by her parents to communicate between the Deaf world and the Hearing world and the burden was sometimes too great for a young child to bear. She grew up feeling responsible for her parents and learned to problem solve in order to keep peace.

Her mother would often volunteer her to interpret, bragging to her Deaf friends, about how well her daughter Juti could interpret in sign language. At the ages of 14 Juti was interpreting at the DMV, AFDC, Social Security, Job interviews, Medical Appointments and once for her parents in the Court of Long Beach, CA at the age of 12 (1962). After her experience in the court the Legal Bug bit her and she knew that she wanted to continue to be an interpreter in the Deaf community. When she was 17 years old, (1967) Juti’s mother told her that the deaf community, had a new organization called ‘GLAD’ Greater Los Angeles Aid to the Council on Deafness, and they hire interpreters and that was the beginning of a long and wonderful career as a professional sign language interpreter. Juti has been called upon many times to facilitate communication between hearing and deaf people who have acquired little or no formal sign language. Instead, using gestures, classifiers, objects, pictures and whatever is at hand to obtain or relay information.

Juti holds a Bachelor’s of Science in Human Services, a Master of Science Degree in Counseling Psychology from Cal State University of Fullerton. Juti did her master’s degree writing project, “Women in Crisis” About how Alcohol and Drugs have impacted Domestic Violence. Her Professor selected the writing project as one of the “to be kept on file” at the CSUF library as an example of a perfect project for Master Students to review. She also has a lifetime, community college teaching certificate to teach ASL and 15 counseling related specialized certificates. She graduated with honors and Dean’s list for her A.A., B.S. M.S. and Ph.D.

She earned a Ph.D. in the Philosophy of Religion, a 5-year course in religious studies at a private college, W.H. Dunn. Her dissertation has been kept on file as an example for future students to reference “In Search of a Life Worth Living” She compiled her dissertation gathering information from her personal experience when she attended 5 different religions, over a period of 5 years. Her professor edited her dissertation into a book to be published and passed away before it was published. She also studied Legal Interpreting at the University of Northern Colorado.