Volunteering in Jamaica
Amanda Womac

For over a decade, volunteers with the Hearing and Speech Foundation have traveled to Jamaica to provide the gift of sound to children at the Caribbean Christian Center for the Deaf (CCCD). This year, I was fortunate enough to be able to accompany the volunteers and learn first-hand the incredible work being done.

This trip, we focused on hearing evaluations, earmold impressions and hearing aid repairs. In January, another team of volunteers, including HSF CEO John Berry, will fit earmolds and hearing aids on all the kids we saw in December.

The first stop on our journey across the island was at the Montego Bay campus of the CCCD where we saw over 50 children Monday, Dec. 6 and Tues., Dec. 7. Our team of three worked hard to get through the list in order to leave Tuesday for the Knockpatrick campus in Mandeville.

For three days, we stayed at Knockpatrick working with over 100 kids from the school. Thursday, 23 kids from the Kingston campus traveled to Knockpatrick to have their hearing tested and aids evaluated. All-in-all, we saw over 175 kids from three different campuses.

Most of the children at CCCD are profoundly deaf and all of the children use sign language to communicate. Putting hearing aids on kids with some residual hearing helps them to develop their speech and therefore, provides more opportunities for them in the future.

Click here to learn more about the history of our Jamaica Mission Project and learn how you can help. To see pictures from the December trip, please click here.