The Susan Klein Family Center for Educational Outreach

The Susan Klein Family Center for Educational Outreach was established in 2004 with a major gift to The Children's Hearing Institute by Robert E. Klein in honor of his wife, author and lecturer, Susan Klein. It is Mr. Klein's wish to help other families like his who are facing the challenges of life following cochlear implantation. A unique program in the New York - New Jersey - Connecticut tri-state area, it is located at The Beth Israel/New York Eye & Ear Cochlear Implant Center. The Klein Family Center provides critical services to support, encourage and educate families, teachers, audiologists, speech therapists and other professionals about successfully navigating the challenges to children and teens with hearing loss. Services include:

Assisting families in choosing the appropriate educational setting for children with hearing loss, including:
- Helping review the child's abilities and determining what kind of educational setting will best help the child maximize learning.
- Evaluating educational programs in the child's community to locate the best program for the child.
- Assisting families in obtaining all necessary services written into the child's Individual Educational Plan.

Assisting schools in providing optimal services to children with hearing loss, including:
- Observing in the classroom to determine how a child is learning.
- Assisting classroom teachers, teachers of the deaf, speech-language pathologists and others in the school in maximizing functioning:
  * Teaching school staff to monitor hearing aids, cochlear implants, and FM systems.
  * Teaching classroom teachers how to help the child use audition to learn.
  * Assisting teachers of the deaf and speech-language pathologists to learn how to help children maximize audition.
- Monitoring classroom acoustics and making suggestions to modify as needed.

Assisting children with hearing loss in receiving appropriate services in the school setting to maximize their ability to achieve success, including:
- Daily listening checks
- Classroom acoustics
- Using an FM system
- Habilitation techniques for maximizing audition
- Using other assistive technology as needed


Assisting families and professionals (mainstream teachers, teachers of the deaf, audiologists, speech/language pathologists) in maximizing the learning environment for children with hearing loss through local and regional conferences, seminars and workshops, including:
- "Teaching the teachers" about hearing loss, hearing aids and cochlear implants.
- How to "trouble shoot" these devices in the classroom to assure that they are functioning, and how to make classroom modifications.