I guess my daughter was a little disillusioned. She had come with me and her big brother to Springfield to testify before the senate insurance committee, and as it turned out we didn’t share our testimony. Our bill was referred to a subcommittee and the proceedings were brief, although Jay Welu and Karen Putz gave eloquent defenses of SB 68 before the committee moved on to other business in a matter of about ten minutes. “Mommy,” she began over dinner at a diner halfway back to Chicago, “Mommy, sometimes you know how there are things we do, or that happen, that….” She paused, carefully considering. I think she was trying to let me down gently. “That don’t really have a point? That’s what happened today. It didn’t have a point. It was for no reason.”
Let me tell you, this girl was geared up to stand quietly before the senators while her mom talked. She was ready to hand them her hearing aids so they could understand what a hearing aid was. And she might have even been ready, given the chance, to tell them that everyone should be able to get a hearing aid if they need one. So she was pretty disappointed not to have the chance after all.
She’s five, but she knows how important this issue is. Because she’s just five, though, she doesn’t know exactly why. She doesn’t know that without hearing help it is harder for kids to learn to read. She doesn’t know that unaided children in public schools cost the system $420,000 per child in special services and remedial education. She doesn’t know that only eight per cent of deaf and hard of hearing children will graduate from college, and she doesn’t know about the 60 to 75% unemployment rate among the deaf and hard of hearing. She doesn’t understand figures like $5,000 for a pair of hearing aids, or what it means to have the insurance you pay for deny coverage for what is surely not a cosmetic enhancement.
She also doesn’t quite get it that when you face what looks like an insurmountable challenge to reach a goal that is simply necessary, absolutely necessary–that whatever you do in order to reach this goal is never for no reason. It always has a point. We have come together, a small group of us, to stand up on behalf of all hearing aid users in Illinois. By fits and starts we have gotten a bill written, introduced, sponsored, and discussed. We have watched with amazement as so many people in our communities have made their voices heard, causing the senate to take notice of this issue. We email, fax, cajole, telephone–Dennis even made a video and put it up on youtube. And little by little our hope advances that this bill, SB 68, will become a law. Every little thing we do has an impact. It does have a point, it is for a reason.
Please join with us, do a little thing: call or write your senator or those on the insurance committee using the information in the previous post, tell your friends to do the same, and have them tell their friends. Have an impact. The time is now.
Julie Vassilatos
hearingaidaction
1 response so far ↓
cher // April 20, 2009 at 2:03 pm |
i did not know how many kids that need hearing aids tell on e day my teah to do a port for in class ….really hard for kids go with out hearing i know i could do it …..no kid should go thorugh it …..i am sry about my spell rally bad i am work on that thank u ….