On the afternoon of 8 May 2005, five students from the National Technical Institute for the Deaf conducted a haiku poetry demonstration, sponsored by PEN-International and open to the public, at Barnes and Noble bookstore in Pittsford, New York. These five students were the winners of the 2005 haiku and tanka competition between NTID and Tsukuba College of Technology (TCT) in Japan, one of PEN-International's partner institutions. The contest was named for Dr. Robert F. Panara, a renowned deaf poet, actor and educator, who personally attended the 8 May showing. Professor Jerome Cushman of NTID, Professor Miyoko Hosoya and Professor Midori Matsufuji of TCT were the faculty leaders of the competition.

The delegation of five students: Stephen McDonald, Sam Sepah, Jessica Thurber, Jack Williams and Christopher Zahniel who won the 2005 Robert F. Panara Haiku Contest will be visiting Tsukuba College of Technology from 22 May through 28 May 2005. They will be accompanied by NTID faculty members Jerome Cushman, Ethan Sinnott, Aaron Kelstone, and Luane Haggerty, and ASL interpreter Deborah Makowski during the week-long visit to Japan.