Rockville, MD - June 7, 2010 - Amanda Angeles, a second grader from California, won first place in the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association's (ASHA) annual Better Hearing and Speech Month (BHSM) Drawing Contest.
Amanda Angeles' Drawing
Angeles, from Birney Elementary in Long Beach, California, received an MP3 player with Active Noise-Cancelling Headphones from Califone International, a sponsor of ASHA's Listen to Your Buds (LTYB) safe listening campaign.
Mrs. Roberson (speech-language pathologist), Mrs. Thrane (Amanda's 2nd grade teacher), Mr. Wood (school principal) and Amanda holding her winning picture.
For the fourth consecutive year, ASHA's drawing contest has encouraged children ten and younger to observe BHSM, an annual event to raise awareness about communication disorders. This year's contest theme, "Protect Your Hearing ...You Need It for a Lifetime," was based on the healthy listening principles of the LTYB campaign (www.listentoyourbuds.org), which teaches children how to use personal audio devices safely.
"In a time when kids are using electronic media more than seven hours a day, this grassroots approach to hearing loss prevention is much needed," says ASHA President Tommie L. Robinson Jr, PhD, CCC-SLP. "The caliber of all of this year's submissions demonstrates the incredible creative power and the desire of children from across the county to help those suffering with hearing loss. Today, as we honor the winners, I am also pleased that the drawing contest is proving to be an innovative way to raise awareness about hearing loss prevention during the BHSM May observance."
The drawing from 2nd place winner Alyssa Gibson.
The drawing from 3rd place winner Madison Gregory.
Second place was awarded to Alyssa Gibson from Manassas, Virginia, and third place went to Madison Gregory of Riverlawn Elementary in Radford, Virginia. The 514 entries received were reviewed and judged on their originality, message, creativity, artistic merit, and expression of the theme.
The winning drawings can be found at www.asha.org/bhsm/.
About the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association
ASHA is the national professional, scientific, and credentialing association for more than 140,000 audiologists, speech-language pathologists, and speech, language, and hearing scientists. Audiologists specialize in preventing and assessing hearing and balance disorders as well as providing audiologic treatment including hearing aids. Speech-language pathologists identify, assess, and treat speech and language problems including swallowing disorders.