We need you to take action by July 28!
Hearing Loss Association of America is requesting the U.S. Access Board undertake a rulemaking on classroom acoustics. Read our letter.
You can support our efforts by sending your own letter of support to the US Access Board. Your letter should include the following talking points:
1. What we are asking: Current ANSI/ASA Standards for Classroom Acoustics should be adopted as part of the Americans with Disabilities Act Accessibility Guidelines.
2. Say that: Appropriate classroom acoustics are necessary for a child to access instruction and communication in his/her classrooms at school. This means hearing what the teacher and all students in the classroom are saying. Talk personally about your child or your grandchildren’s needs in the classroom.
3. Please send your brief letter immediately so that it arrives in advance of the upcoming Board meeting on July 28.
Send your letter to:
David Capozzi, Executive Director
U.S. Access Board
1331 F St. NW, Suite 1000
Washington, DC 20004
Background
In 1997, the Architectural and Transportation Barriers Compliance Board (Access Board) received a petition from a parent of a child with hearing loss, alleging that poor classroom acoustics constituted an architectural barrier to their child’s educational opportunities. The Access Board and the Acoustical Society of America worked on and developed a classroom acoustics standard that was adopted in 2002.
The Acoustical Society of America submitted the standard to the International Code Council (ICC) for inclusion in the international building codes (IBC). Here the standard would create better listening environments for all students rather than being focused on accessibility for students with hearing disabilities. In May of this year, eight years after completion and 13 years since the petition was received by the Access Board, the ICC voted against adoption of the standard.
Parents, professionals, and consumer advocates alike are outraged at this decision and distressed at the amount of time that has passed. We have lost a generation of students who could have benefited from better classroom acoustical conditions. The cost to design and build to the acoustical standard is minimal compared with the cost to our children’s ability to fully participate in the classroom. This is a civil rights issue!
**One free copy of the current version of the standard may be obtained at: http://asa.aip.org/ American National Standards Institute/Acoustical Society of America (2010). ANSI/ASA S12.60-2010. American National Standard: Acoustical Performance Criteria, Design Requirements, and Guidelines for Schools, Part 1: Permanent Schools & Part 2: Relocatable Classroom Factors (2009). Melville, NY: Acoustical Society of America.**
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The following letter was sent 7/25:
ReplyDeletePlease adopt current ANSI/ASA Standards for Classroom Acoustics as part of the Americans with Disabilities Act Accessibility Guidelines. This is a necessary and long-needed action.
Appropriate classroom acoustics are necessary for a child to access instruction and communication in his/her classrooms at school. This means hearing what the teacher and all students in the classroom are saying.
As a child, I had a fluctuating hearing loss and had great difficulty hearing my teacher in the classrooms of the 1950s and 1960s. One of my 2 daughters is hyperacoustic, the other has a mild-moderate hearing loss. Both had difficulty understanding in the classrooms of the 1980s and 1990s. I was a teacher, then a Special Education Coordinator and saw many children struggle with the issue of auditory discrimination, and understanding in the classrooms of the 1990s and 2000s. This is six decades of children who struggled to learn in the classroom because they could not hear clearly!
It is time that American schools everywhere enabled children to succeed is every way they can -- without taking the responsibility to learn away from the children, of course. We, as parents and educators and legislators need to do whatever we can to help our children with their task of learning.
Therefore, I ask again: Please adopt current ANSI/ASA Standards for Classroom Acoustics as part of the Americans with Disabilities Act Accessibility Guidelines.
Thank you for your prompt consideration of my request.