PreK - 12

Public Education Options in Florida

In Florida, there are many public educational options for children (3-21) who are deaf, hard of hearing or deaf-blind, which range from the state residential school (the Florida School for the Deaf and the Blind) in St. Augustine to full mainstreaming in a general education classroom and many options in between, depending on the student's educational, communication and social needs.

General education teachers and teachers of the deaf and hard of hearing work together to meet the goals of the student's individual education plan (IEP.)  Educational interpreters are available in order to facilitate communication.  Educational audiology services promote access to communication and instruction through the development of audition and the use of amplification. Special projects funded through federal and state allocations address the unique communication and technology needs of students who are deaf or hard of hearing.

Useful links:

• Florida Department of Education
• Bureau of Exceptional Education and Student Services
• State Board of Education Rule - Deaf/Hard-of-Hearing
• State Board of Education Rule - Dual Sensory Impaired
• Procedural Safeguards for Students with Disabilities
• Florida School for the Deaf and the Blind
• Resource Materials and Technology Center for the Deaf/Hard-of-Hearing
• Florida Outreach Project for Children and Young Adults who are Deaf-Blind
• Help with the IEP Process

There are also some private schools in Florida which serve students through Family Empowerment Scholarship for Unique Disabilities scholarships.

Children's Hearing Help Fund

Donation Box on Driver's License Renewal

A significant barrier to successful intervention outcomes has become very apparent since the implementation of the enactment of Florida's Universal Newborn Hearing Screening Law, Statute 383.815. Following diagnosis, it is not unusual for some infants to experience delays of 6 months or more prior to hearing evaluation and hearing aid fitting due to a variety of issues primarily related to funding and/or parental uncertainty of how to proceed. The new law authorized the Department of Motor Vehicles to include a $1 donation check-off box on every driver?s license renewal form that allows funds to be collected to aid families who don't have the means to pay for hearing aids for children who have been found to have hearing loss.

The Children's Hearing Help Fund (CHHF) will be used to provide assistance for qualifying families with minor children, from newborns to eighteen years of age for services such as hearing evaluations, loaner hearing devices, permanent hearing devices or the ongoing maintenance and replacement of the devices if necessary until the child reaches eighteen years of age. Hearing loss is the most common birth defect with three out of every 1000 newborns being found to have a permanent hearing problem that causes them to be at high risk for developing communication delays unless early help is provided to their families. Florida can expect approximately 600 new children to be confirmed as hearing impaired annually. Approximately 37% of families have insurance and/or financial resources however insurance rarely covers even a portion of hearing aids and most families with young children cannot readily afford to pay for hearing aids, each of which can cost as much as a refrigerator ($1000-$3000) and may need to be replaced every 3 years. Approximately 43% of children will have Medicaid coverage that could be applied to meet the cost of permanent amplification devices and an additional 20% are found to be from financially needy families that have no resources available. Therefore many families are faced with trying to purchase expensive hearing aids, typically 5-6 times before the child becomes an adult.

Charitable funding sources for families to turn to for assistance with purchasing amplification for children have historically been very limited. Early intervention and quality education is necessary to prevent developmental delays in language and learning. The Children's Hearing Help Fund will exist in order to provide the necessary funding to enable children from financially needy families to obtain amplification for their children (loaner or permanent) within 30 days of recommendation for hearing aid fitting, when no other funding options are available.

Information and Statistics

• Nationally, three out of every 1000 newborns have a hearing loss. It is the most common birth defect.
• Even mild hearing loss or hearing loss in only one ear, if undetected, has substantial detrimental consequences. Research shows that children with hearing loss in one ear are 10 times as likely to be held back at least one grade level compared to matched group of children with normal hearing. Research notes that children identified with hearing loss at birth are, by the time they enter school, one to two years developmentally ahead of their hearing impaired peers who were not diagnosed until after they were six months old.
• Before universal newborn hearing screening the average age at which children were diagnosed with hearing loss was 2.5 years. Very important speech-language development occurs significantly earlier and these children frequently required intensive special instruction throughout all their school years.
• Through identification of hearing loss in the first 3 months and by working with the parents and caregivers to communicate effectively with their child thereby preventing delays in language, cognitive and social development these early identified children have the opportunity to develop on par with unimpaired peers. Without amplification and early intervention services by 6 months of age, lifelong delays in communication and learning may be expected.
• By the time a child with hearing loss graduates from high school, more than $400,000 per child can be saved in special education costs if the child is identified early and given appropriate educational, medical, and audiological services.
• Only by continuing consistent use of appropriate and well functioning amplification, can children with hearing loss continue to have the opportunity to access teacher instruction in classrooms using their remaining hearing. When the hearing aids of a school-age child need to be replaced or repaired, every day that the child is unable to hear optimally can be like a day they are absent from school!

Information and statistics courtesy of the National Center for Hearing Assessment and Management - Utah State University (NCHAM) or the National Institute on Deafness and Communicative Disorders (NIDCD).

Described and Captioned Media Program (DCMP)

The DCMP provides services designed to support and improve the academic achievement of students who are blind, visually impaired, deaf, hard of hearing, or deaf-blind.