Page 10 - Help Hope Grow Flipbook

A Year in the Life of High Hopes ““HIGH HOPES TOOK

THE BROKENNESS

544 Clinic Patients 128 Preschool Students AND DESPAIR IN OUR
18,830 Therapy Visits 126,360 Instructional
Hours HEARTS AND TURNED
55% Our preschoolers IT INTO COURAGE AND

consistently score
EMPOWERMENT.””
Annual therapy patients well above average
on nationally
have increased by 55% normed
since opening our doors Kindergarten Max was never supposed to walk.
at High Hopes Court. readiness tests. One day during a therapy session at High
Hopes after months of hard work, I watched
our Max walk for the first time! His big
brown eyes were filled with happiness. He
looked at me as if to say, “Look at me, Momma. I’m walking!” I smiled
back at him, tears streaming down my face.

Max and I would attempt to communicate as I looked into his beautiful
eyes, but with a broken heart, I had accepted that
we would never, ever share a conversation together.

A most beautiful day at High Hopes, I shared my first conversation with
my son! It was a perfectly ordinary, wonderful, magical chat about the
weather. Yes, the weather. High Hopes understood the power of Max’s
gaze and his desire to communicate. They taught him to use assistive
technology that recognizes the gaze of his eyes to tell all of us what he is
thinking, how he feels, and what he dreams to become in the future. The
621 Volunteers
7,643 Volunteer Hours technology uses eye tracking to write messages using only his eyes and
then the computer speaks those messages aloud. Now, we ask each other
a lot of questions, share stories, and say “I love you” every chance we
Almost
3 times get.

more annual volunteers High Hopes took the brokenness and despair in our hearts and turned
have given of their time it into courage and empowerment. High Hopes saw the determination
since being at our new
building. in a young boy to fight for the life he deserves and helped him. I can’t
imagine where we would be today were it not for High Hopes.
The estimated value of each volunteer hour in Tennessee is $22.15*.
*source: IndependentSector.org ~Pamela & Lay