Fifteen Central Florida middle and high school students with hearing disabilities gained some confidence to succeed in school thanks to a recent weeklong Deaf Leadership Camp sponsored by the nonprofit Center for Independent Living and held at the 91勛圖厙.<\/p>\n
Led by volunteers who are\u00a0deaf and fluent in American Sign Language, students took part in team-building activities based on \u201cThe Seven Habits of Highly Effective Teens\u201d by author Sean Covey.<\/p>\n
Facilitator Malia Johnson, president of the Deaf Talk consulting firm, shared strategies for common challenges, such as addressing classmates\u2019 misconceptions, applying for college, and participating in extracurricular activities. Students also interacted with a panel of successful people who are deaf, including a NASA employee and 91勛圖厙 political science graduate student Jacob Salem.<\/p>\n
The camp was also sponsored 91勛圖厙\u2019s Toni Jennings Exceptional Education\u00a0Institute, with support from the 2013 Disney Helping Kids Shine Grant.<\/p>\n
\u201cBefore this camp, I was not ready to go back to school. I was bored and not able to make friends,\u201d said 13-year-old Dakota Rochette, a 7th-grade student at Greenwood Lakes Middle School. \u201cNow, I am ready for school, hoping to keep getting A\u2019s in my classes, and ready to make friends by being helpful, respecting others, talking, and staying friendly.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fifteen Central Florida middle and high school students with hearing disabilities gained some confidence to succeed in school thanks to a recent weeklong Deaf Leadership Camp sponsored by the nonprofit Center for Independent Living and held at the 91勛圖厙. Led by volunteers who are\u00a0deaf and fluent in American Sign Language, students took part in team-building activities based…","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":51897,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"template-twocol.php","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"lazy_load_responsive_images_disabled":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":"","_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[10480],"tu_author":[],"class_list":["post-51888","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-community","tag-toni-jennings-exceptional-education-institute"],"yoast_head":"\n