On the last day of half-term, Friday 20 October, the College was awash with colour and style as everyone wore their loudest shirts and t-shirts for Loud Shirt Day.
The aim of Loud Shirt Day is to raise awareness of the great work that Auditory Verbal UK (AVUK) carry out for babies and children who are deaf.
AVUK’s vision is that all deaf children have the same opportunities in life as their hearing peers. They want to raise expectations and outcomes for deaf children and work to increase awareness, understanding and access to Auditory Verbal therapy by providing services directly to families and sharing our expertise with health and education professionals.
Auditory Verbal therapy supports deaf children to learn how to make sense of the sound they receive through their hearing technology (such as hearing aids or cochlear implants) so they can learn to talk like their hearing friends. Currently, less than 10% of deaf children can access the therapy and AVUK campaign for this to change.
Year 12 pupil, Ava Pearson, has been championing this cause at the College and is someone who learned to listen and talk through AVUK’s programme as a young child. In the leadup to Loud Shirt Day, Ava was already getting loud by speaking in a Whole School Assembly, as well as presenting to the Year 12 pupils about how AVUK supports deaf children and young people.
She said:
‘Thanks to the support AVUK gave me as a baby to learn to listen and speak, I have never felt that being deaf means I can’t do and enjoy the same things my hearing friends do. I joined Shiplake this September and I’m so pleased they are supporting Loud Shirt Day and given me the chance to show what young deaf children can achieve and raise money to help more access the support I had.’
Make sure you check out some of the LOUD shirts and t-shirts in the gallery below!
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