This Help America Hear scholarship winner shares how self-advocacy in the classroom and on the soccer field helped him succeed.

By Georgios Anamisis

I benefited from newborn hearing screenings. My parents didn’t expect to have any issues with the screening. As far as they knew, no one in our family had hearing loss from a young age. Each time they tested my hearing, they came back and said I didn’t pass and that we’d try again. Eventually my parents were told I had hearing loss. This was a shock to them, and they had to do research on what this meant. 

Hearing loss occurs when someone is not able to hear sounds or speech within an expected range. Hearing loss can range from mild to profound and occur for many reasons, including a congenital disorder, injury, disease, exposure to loud noise, or as a result of age. My hearing loss is a result of Usher syndrome, a rare congenital disorder characterized by combined hearing loss and progressive vision loss.

My hearing impairment was identified at birth. On the other hand, my vision impairment was diagnosed one year ago, the week before my 17th birthday. 

School and Soccer

I received my first pair of hearing aids at 9 weeks old and started speech therapy at 10 weeks of age. My parents told me that speech therapy at that age consisted of my audiologist helping me localize sounds as well as training my parents to be very verbal with me. My parents were taught to use as much language as possible to help me learn language at the same rate as my friends. 

My parents decided the best school environment for me was a Montessori school where my teacher would give instructions directly to me and/or a small group. My parents and teachers worked with me to advocate for myself and sit near them so I could hear the lesson more clearly. Advocating for myself by sitting close to my teacher or athletic coach was very effective in reducing the distracting noises and increasing the important directions they gave.

Throughout my schooling, teachers would allow me to sit up front and ask questions. These efforts paid off as I’ve successfully completed 11 honors classes and eight Advanced Placement classes. I was invited to attend the University of Central Florida’s Summer Institute for Computer Science and join the National Honor Society. 

Athletic coaches were also very supportive of me and my effort to try not to miss information. More specifically, I tried out and was chosen to play soccer on a competitive team when I was 11 years old, and the next year was playing on a much larger field than I was used to. This meant I was faced with the challenge of hearing my coach across a much larger distance.

Initially, my coach pulled me from games as I couldn’t hear his directions. Teammates would try and help but it wasn’t enough. The FM system wasn’t an option since I played defense was often on the opposite corner of the field from my coach. My parents and I knew we had to come up with a new solution and started doing research. We found a device that I wore on my arm like an iPod and my coach wore a small microphone around his neck. It had a range of several hundred feet and solved my problem of hearing directions quickly.

This device, in conjunction with my hearing aids, permitted me to continue to participate in competitive soccer through my middle and high school years. I excelled in defense and also played the striker position. I was well-respected by my coaches and teammates, so much so that I was voted team captain for numerous seasons.

Wearing hearing aids and being part of the hearing community allowed me to volunteer with U.S. Youth Soccer’s The Outreach Program for Soccer (TOPS) where I mentored an 8-year-old autistic boy on how to play the game, and become a Certified United States Soccer Federation Referee where I worked several games and tournaments. 

I also had the unique opportunity to be a junior recruit and train with the USA Deaf Soccer Men's National Team. It was my first experience with Deaf culture. You can imagine how odd it was when I was about to head out onto the field for my first team practice and the coach reminded me to take my hearing aids off. Up until that weekend, I had only seen a couple kids who wore hearing aids and always felt different from my peers.

Taking my hearing aids off in a social setting was counter to anything I had ever done before where speech was the primary source of information and communication. In this arena, the focus was on nonverbal communication. I quickly learned that a raised hand by the referee indicated a foul and a raised hand by a player indicated availability. In many ways, being around other people who wore hearing aids made me feel at home. It made an impression on me, and I wanted to continue playing with them. I learned American Sign Language so I could communicate with more players the next time we gathered. 

Advocating for myself as a hearing impaired student and athlete helped me develop my leadership skills. As a junior in high school, I co-founded and serve as vice president of the Engineering Club. I also served as vice president of my church youth group and leader of my Greek folk dancing group. Under my leadership, my Greek folk dancing group won best performance, folk expression, and costume awards at the National Hellenic Dance Festival competition. I work an average of 20 hours per week with a great team at the Men’s Wearhouse and have learned the importance of showing up for and supporting colleagues in a professional workplace. 

Silver Linings

I am very grateful for the ability to wear hearing aids. Without them I would not be able to hear and learn in mainstream schools. But as incredible as hearing technology is, it also amplifies a lot of noises I don’t need to hear. As a result, having hearing loss has resulted in me being very productive in school because I often must concentrate and listen harder than my friends who aren’t hearing impaired. I’m usually exhausted after a full day of school. I feel like I have to work harder to achieve goals as compared to my hearing friends.

My parents and I worked with our schools to create formal plans that would give me some reprieve including extra time to complete tests and assignments. My plans have also included the use of teacher’s notes since I may have breaks in my ability to hear the teacher and miss important information. I plan to meet with the student accessibility services in college to request these same services in college. 

I’ve learned how important it is to balance my responsibilities with activities I enjoy so I don’t feel overwhelmed. Taking a break after school helps me be more productive later in the day, if needed. I recently picked up skateboarding and electric guitar as new hobbies and try to do both daily.

I’m excited to start a new chapter in my life at college. I’ve always been fascinated with how things work and have considered electrical and/or mechanical engineering. It would be very powerful for someone who has worn hearing aids for all his life to design hearing aid technology to fit various stages of life and lifestyles.

I’ve gone from not wanting my hearing aids to show to choosing colorful ear molds that call attention to themselves. I have succeeded both in the classroom and on the soccer field in the humid Florida climate because I learned how to effectively advocate for my needs as a person with hearing impairment.

In the future I want to be able to engineer in-the-ear hearing aids that will be both powerful enough to be used by people with severe hearing loss while also being Bluetooth enabled. I know I will bring a unique perspective to hearing aid technology and help meet the needs of many hearing impaired individuals to help further improve our quality of life. I also hope to continue to show how determination and self-advocacy can bring about confidence and the ability for all hearing impaired individuals to break down barriers and achieve any goal we have.

A resident of Florida, Georgios Anamisis will be attending the University of South Florida. This story is adapted from his essay that earned him one of Help America Hear’s 2023 scholarships.

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