Using Technology to Serve Children Who are Deaf

Your support helped Listen and Talk serve 143 families in Early Intervention this past school year, a 25% increase from the number of families served prior to initiating the Virtual Home Visit model of service delivery!

By reaching more families than ever before you are helping us steer the course for children to have the opportunity to move into mainstream schools and compete and succeed side by side their mates with normal hearing. The implications are significant for families seeking to provide their child with limitless possibilities. It is also significant for the wider community. The development of age appropriate language skills in children with hearing loss saves tax dollars and improves the academic and employment opportunities for these individuals. Reaching more families through Virtual Home Visits multiplies the impact of early intervention and decreases the costs of special education for these children, benefitting our entire community.

We recognize the importance of evaluating outcomes for these children and families. To this end, Listen and Talk has been participating in and recently completed the data collection for a national multi-center study to evaluate the cost and effectiveness of Virtual Home Visits compared with in-home visits. The results from this study will provide important insights for continued improvement in the quality and efficiency with which we provide service. We look forward to sharing those findings in a report to the Global Giving Community and others later this year.    

Your support is helping us reach more families than ever before resulting in children having greater potential than ever to not be limited by hearing loss. Thank you for your generous support.

Dear GlobalGiving Community,

Your support of our Virtual Home Visiting (VHV) project is helping Listen and Talk reach more families than ever before! You should be proud to know that YOUR generous donations are directly impacting how many children get served.

In addition to all of the VHV benefits we outlined in earlier reports, we want to share some recent and exciting advancements: 

• 100% staff participation: All 9 Early Intervention staff members are oriented and supported to implement services through VHV.
• More families receiving service: Approximately 1/3 of the families we serve are receiving support through VHV.
• We are getting the word out: Listen and Talk staff members have published their experiences with VHV in industry-relevant periodicals.
• Demonstrating outcomes: Listen and Talk is participating in a multi-center national study to help evaluate the cost-effectiveness of the VHV model.
• Increased demand: Listen and Talk is receiving increased interest in providing direct services in areas further afield from our historical service areas.
• Increased interest in the service model: Listen and Talk is receiving frequent requests for training and development of the model in other agencies.

Your support is helping us to more fully implement our VHV model. Thanks again for making a difference.

With gratitude,

Listen and Talk