Helping deaf children speak

4:37pm Thursday 15th May 2008

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A £5,000 donation by sixth formers in Bushey has bought solar powered hearing aids for 50 deaf children in Africa.

Year 13 students from Queens' School raised the money for the Mramba School for the deaf in Tanzania after already working to repair and repaint its buildings last summer.

Receiving the money on Friday, Seema Shah of the Hearing Conservation Council said the aids had allowed the children to hear and speak for the first times in their lives. She said: "When we went into the school there was total silence. When we left it had a voice."

Queens' School's fundraising work started after one of the students involved, Nick Taylor, showed his family photographs of the World Challenge trip to Tanzania.

His family and friends led him to people and organisations that could give additional help to the school, including the Hearing Conservation Council.