The Connected Life: Using Access Technology at Home, at School and in the Community

Abstract

Hearing technologies such as hearing aids, cochlear implants and bone-anchored devices provide students with hearing loss with far greater access to auditory information (and most importantly, to spoken language) than even a decade ago. However, in a student’s daily life, many situations arise where effective communication and participation can be comprised by factors such as distance, noise, reverberation, difficulty hearing peer input, missing or obscured visual information (e.g., due to masks during the COVID-19 pandemic), speakers with accents or poor auditory/visual quality (e.g., on the phone or during online learning). Access technologies such as remote microphone systems, wireless connectivity platforms and captioning can be used to supplement and/or clarify auditory and visual information, so that students can fully participate in all aspects of their lives. This article discusses how access technologies can provide support for students in preschool, elementary, secondary and postsecondary education. The importance of universal design for access to public spaces, such as schools and community spaces, to ensure that individuals with hearing loss live in an equitable and inclusive world are also discussed.