Better Hearing in Education for Northern Youth (BHENY - pronounced Bennie) was the product of an amazing juxtaposition of Rotarian Dr. Lynne McCurdy’s commitment to both her profession as an Audiologist and her desire as a member of RC Guelph’s Indigenous Awareness Committee to make a difference in the lives of Canada’s hearing impaired Inuit children in Nunavut.
After two self-funded trips to Iqaluit - listening, learning and making many important connections, Lynne honed in on a project that had been dreamed of by the local audiologist and a special education consultant, but had not seemed possible to implement. This is where Lynne’s knowledge, commitment, and Rotary connections allowed her to envision the BHENY project and moved her to inspire others to join her.
The goal of the BHENY project was to address hearing loss in youth, beginning with 13 underserviced communities in the Qikiqtani region of Nunavut. There is an extremely high prevalence of hearing loss in Inuit children and youth due to complications from ear infections. Elsewhere in Canada, permanent hearing loss resulting from complications of ear infections is rare, but it is extremely common in Arctic regions. BHENY focused on installing field sound systems in classrooms in all 13 communities. Sound field systems use a teacher worn microphone and wall-mounted speakers to enhance the teacher’s voice. Sound amplification enhances the clarity of the teacher’s voice so everyone can hear. Outcomes include earlier identification of hearing loss in students, improved reading, writing and numeracy skills, better language learning (Inuktitut and English) and improved high school graduation rates.
By December 2018, BHENY team members had worked in 16 communities. They installed 202 Soundfield systems in 14 schools across the Baffin (Qikiqtani) Region of Nunavut. They trained 235 teachers and 76 Student Support Teachers and their Assistants who received extra training to ensure that the project was sustainable. One of the highlights of the training in each community was always the Hearing Fair – where children from each classroom rotated through 5 stations dedicated to information about hearing loss with the goal to not only educate, but hopefully to start down the pathway to reducing the stigma around wearing hearing aids. Approximately 2,791 children attended these Hearing Fairs. Read more ...