April After the AGM 2022 the committee became aware that having just one paediatric audiologist on the island puts him/her under a lot of pressure. Partly because of the pandemic, waiting lists at MSG audiology were getting longer, having one audiologist means he/she needs to be an expert in everything - this means that if our audiologist is ill, away on a course, or on holiday there is no available paediatric audiologist on the island. This coincided with a parent telling us that her sons radio aid wasn’t working, after sensory support tried to help they were sent to audiology, the audiologist was unavailable for a number of days leaving the child to attend school without the equipment he needs.

The committee met to see if GDCS could help by funding a locum audiologist to at least bring down the waiting lists - this would not fix the problem long term, it was very clear to us that a second audiologist was required at MSG. If we were to fund a second audiologist, how would that work? How could we measure improvement to the service? How would we ensure that funds we paid would go towards children (only) with a hearing loss? What followed was many meetings with NDCS and MSG. Eventually, after weeks of work, the committee decided in July that this wasn’t the best way to use the money donated to our charity.

May we had a visit to the fire station, a total of 13 of us, we started with a chat about fire safety, fire alarms and equipment available. Followed by a tour of the station, then ( what the children were waiting for) a close up look at the engines. We watched the fire fighters do a training exercise and even had a go of putting out a (pretend) fire ourselves. A very enjoyable morning.

June Jon and I attended the new charity ordinance workshop meeting.

During the summer month we tried to organise another event, Denise tried to organise a trip to the accidental zoo, but they couldn’t accommodate us out of term time, Emma and I also looked into a golf event at 19 but there wasn’t a weekend where more than one committee member was free.

Over the summer Hayley, Steph and I met to discuss our experience with the support children are getting from the Sensory Support Service. We came to the conclusion that communication between professionals involved with children with a hearing loss is very poor, no one is monitoring their achievements, observing how they are coping at school - there is also very little or no communication between the ToD and parents, or students. I spoke to NDCS to get their input, they suggested CHSWG (Children’s Hearing Service Working Group) this is a platform any professionals supporting the children can share and update information. Great idea, but we need to sell it to the professional groups.

October Steph kindly organised a climbing session at Up Climb, 11 children put their names down for the challenge. The staff had some great games to play bringing all the children of various ages together.

November we received a request for funding to buy a motorbike helmet for a child struggling to wear hearing aids with her old helmet. This was approved by the committee.

A focus group was organised along with NDCS to discuss our experience with audiology, good and bad, followed by a questionnaire which I sent to as many parents as I could. NDCS shared our concerns about the pressure the audiologist was under and wrote a letter to MSG via ourselves. MSG replied saying that the will hold a review of the service.

Still in contact with education about the sensory support service. I sent many emails highlighting issues that I was aware of. As the ToD was on long term sickness education was looking into the possibility of hiring a locum.

Still in November we had the round table Christmas Fayre, Gill sold the lovely Pom-Pom lights that she made along with some Christmas cakes, I made the Reindeer flannels, Denise did some painted flowerpots with treats in them, Elliot did a ‘hug in a mug’ and Hayley some Reindeer food. The day was a little quiet (Covid still around) we sold most of our things, then sold the rest by taking items into work to sell. We raised a record amount £584.27

This was quickly followed by Ice skating, 15 people put their names down to brave the ice, at the end of the session, the children were rewarded with a good size bag of chocolate coins. Thank you Gill for organising

We also had our Christmas tree on display again at the town church Xmas tree festival. I think other charities took note of our tree the previous year and used brighter colours, some even used pompoms, but our tree still stood out and made it into the press. Thank you Emma for sorting this one out for us.

New year!

Bit of a slow start for the committee as attempts to hold committee meetings were interrupted by COVID.

We started the year meeting up with education a couple of times to discuss matters we have raised. The head of inclusion in education also agreed to meet up, he was keen to talk about the SEND review taking place, they have 2 years to implement new recommendations, we tried to explain that we were concerned about what is happening in the schools today! The charity wrote to education suggesting 12 changes to the service and giving them the link to the CHSWG as suggested by NDCS.

April An attempt by Hayley to organise an event at Aztech football had to be postponed as many children dropped out at the last minute. This left us with some disappoint children so we promise we will organise this again soon.

May Living Well With Hearing Loss - an event organised by the Hard of Hearing Association. I contacted the library to ask them to order some inclusive books for children with a hearing loss, they bought a lovely selection, the books arrived in time for Deaf awareness week, then they lent them to us to display on out table at this event. We also ordered 3 dolls that have either hearing aids, or a cochlea implant for our table, we also had a colouring table for our younger visitors. The event was very well organised, I met some really interesting people.

At the end of May we organised a pop-in pottery painting session one morning at Iris and Dora, we had 15 people turn up, two families commented that it was easier for them to come if it was a pop in event. I really enjoyed this event, I managed to move around and spend time with all the children and parents.

That is our year - I feel that we should apologise for not having as many events as we usually have, but we have had a lot on our plate.

One more thing to say is that none of this would have been possible without the support from the GDCS team. Being able to talk things through with fellow committee members was very valuable and kept my focus. So to the team, thank you very much.

Leonie Burrows.

Chairperson.