First in a series.
Identifying the most common birth defect in America may surprise you.
Every day 33 babies are born with permanent hearing loss, says Michelle Christie, Ed.D, exuberant founder of the remarkable No Limits for Deaf Children organization of Culver City, now in its 20th year.
A former teacher at Echo Horizon School, she has shined a hometown spotlight on an imperfection that receives abundant attention here but is underserved across the country.
No Limits educates deaf and hard-of-hearing children from 5 to 18 years old.
An Enduring Label
Even in an instantaneous technological world where now almost becomes past tense, some stigmas never change, deafness and its forms among them.
Tucked away on the second floor of the Downtown Chase Bank, across from the Kirk Douglas Theatre, this splendidly vivid and varied setting turns into an after-school Disneyland for the Deaf.
Dr. Christie emphasizes that a commitment to bring deaf and hard-of-hearing youngsters into the vast taken-for-granted universe of the hearing hardly is a matter of flinging open her doors and stepping aside for the crowds to pour in.
The nagging stigma attached to deafness – denial – is common among new young students and their parents. It is not so unusual for younger children to arrive with practically invisible vocabularies and thoroughly untested learning skills.
Elizabeth Sanchez, Dr. Christie’s aide, explained that deafness at birth is indiscriminate, not favoring any culture.
Magnificent artistry adorns a half-dozen rooms – precise learning spaces for the staff of 18 teaching specialists — with arrestingly different themes, all richly designed to capture the previously unexplored attention and applicable skills of children who never have heard a sound.
Star Power
Mention of artistry is the signal for Enid Wizig, the most unusual and prominent volunteer for No Limits, to step forward.
She practically arrived with the furniture at No Limits, at its birth 20 years ago when she was only slightly younger, not a speck changed otherwise.
At this point it will be appropriate for everyone to join in a cheerful chorus of “Happy Birthday.”
This multiply singular humanitarian model turns 92 years old on Saturday, and who could have guessed it?
The blended miracle of Ms. Wizig’s age and her globally interminable energy add up to a miracle of unfathomable inspiration both for deaf children and their parents. She, too, lives with a loss of hearing, and her accomplishments, in Hollywood and Culver City, form a golden history that does indeed inspire.
Perhaps 50 percent of the widowed Ms. Wizig’s value is that she is the author of much of the creative artwork that forms the backdrop for the No Limit classrooms that children attend daily.
Intertwined with her other 50 percent is the immeasurable inspiration she delivers to perhaps doubting youngsters and skeptical parents.
(To be continued)