President Zimpher to take quiet time

In honor of Better Hearing and Speech Month, the University of Cincinnati College of Allied Health Sciences is scheduled to hold Sponsored Silence during its ninth annual Presentations of Research and Innovative/Scholarly Endeavors Conference Friday, May 11.

UC President Nancy Zimpher is set to open the event at 9 a.m. in the Kresge Auditorium inside the Medical Sciences Building. Zimpher is also the focus of the Sponsored Silence.

During a Sponsored Silence, a public figure remains silent for 15 minutes during his or her work day, Martha Coen-Cummings, state chair of the event, said. During this 15-minute time period, the person has to communicate using an augmentative and alternative communication device, a type writer-like device with 32 buttons programmed to say certain words or sentences.

"My students heard about Sponsored Silence and they really wanted her to give the opening," Carney Sotto, assistant clinical professor and director of undergraduate studies in communication sciences and disorders said.

Sotto said the students wanted to do the Sponsored Silence event to raise awareness for hearing and speech communications in the Cincinnati area.

"The intent of Sponsored Silence is to increase public awareness regarding the importance of communication and the profound impact and isolation that can occur when communication is disrupted or completely lost," Sotto said.

UC is the third school to participate in the Sponsored Silence event. Coen-Cummings said after this year she plans to take the idea to Washington, D.C. to make it a national event.

Coen-Cummings said she got the idea while seeing a similar event in Australia. She said the "sponsored" part of it is to make people who are watching the event feel included.

"Our point is to do it publicly so that the public is aware of what happens when you aren't born with a voice or you lose your voice," Coen-Cummings said. "It could happen to anyone."

Past participants have been U.S. Sen. David Goodman, R-Ohio, and Loveland Intermediate School Principal Warren McClellan.

"Colleagues, coworkers and children had the opportunity to sponsor the principal's silence for a 15-minute period," Coen-Cummings said. "Sponsorship [at this particular event] cost was 25 cents per minute or a discretionary donation of up to $5 for the 15-minute period."

Coen-Cummings said McClellan chose to do his 15-minutes of silence during a fifth-grade recess. He designed the augmentative and alternative communication device to reflect his game of choice: four square. But when a young boy came up to him and wanted to play baseball he couldn't. It wasn't that he was physically incapable, he just didn't have the words to do it.

"People think that it is easy to use an AAC device but it takes years of practice," Coen-Cummings said.

After the event, the National Student Speech-Language-Hearing Association is scheduled to give a donation to the UC Speech and Hearing Clinic, which aids in providing scholarships for children who cannot afford to have speech-language therapy.

"If you have any chance of being there, I suggest you do it," Coen-Cummings said. "Because it's going to be really cool."

After the Sponsored Silence, undergraduate and graduate students from the College of Allied Health are set to present their research.

At noon, Dr. Jeff Livingston is set to give a keynote speech a the event. Livingston is an assistant professor of Obstetrics & Gynecology and associate director of the Fetal Care Center of Cincinnati. He will be talking about fetal surgery and the medical advances made regarding hearing and speech problems.