Meet our collaborators

We would like to thank the professionals below for being part of My World working group. Through their dedicated efforts and creative collaboration, they helped develop the supporting resources for the My World tool found on this website.  Because of their efforts, pediatric audiologists from around the world can now access a rich trove of information on how to use the My World tool with children.

Birgitte Franck is a Speech Language Pathologist and Hearing Consultant. She has 41 years of experience working with hearing impaired children, 22 of which she spent working at an audiology clinic. Birgitte is particularly interested in how to help children with hearing loss learn how to speak and how to educate parents to become the children's most important resource in language development. She has also published extensively about children with hearing loss.

Carrie Spangler, AuD. is an educational audiologist. Carrie graduated from the University of Akron with a masters in audiology and Arizona School of Health Sciences with a doctorate of audiology. In addition to 13 years as a hearing care professional, Carrie brings a lifetime of personal experiences growing up and living life with a bilateral hearing loss. Carrie's areas of interest include pediatrics, education, technology, counseling, and advocacy.

Cheryl DeConde Johnson specializes in systems development in audiology and deaf education via her consulting practice, The ADEvantage (Audiology Deaf Education vantage). She also holds adjunct faculty appointments in deaf education at the University of Arizona, and in audiology at the University of Colorado and University of Northern Colorado. Cheryl is president of the Board of Directors for Hands & Voices and is active promoting high standards and communication access for children with hearing loss.

Christine Yoshinaga-Itano, PhD. is a Professor of Audiology and Chair in the Department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences, faculty of the Institute of Cognitive Science, Center for Neurosciences at the University of Colorado, Boulder. She also serves as a Professor of Audiology at the Department of Otolaryngology and Audiology at the University of Colorado, Denver and at  the Marion Downs Hearing Center. She has conducted research in the areas of language, speech, and social-emotional development of deaf and hard-of-hearing infants and children for over thirty years. Over the last 25 years, she has focused on the impact of early-identification and early intervention on the developmental outcomes of children with significant hearing loss.

Eileen Rall, AuD, has been an audiologist at The Children's Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) since 1995. Along with her clinical responsibilities, Eileen coordinates CHOP's Assessment and Treatment Implementation Program for Infants and toddlers with Hearing Loss - Enhancing Rehabilitation "CATIPIHLER." Eileen currently participates in all aspects of care within the department but has a special interest in pediatric amplification and supporting psychosocial development of children with hearing loss. Before working at CHOP, Eileen was an audiologist in both a general hospital setting and in a private ENT practice. Eileen is also an adjunct faculty member at the George S. Osborne School of Audiology at Salus University.

Jane Madell, Ph.D., is an audiologist, speech-language pathologist, and LSLS auditory verbal therapist, with degrees from Emerson College (BA) and the University of Wisconsin (MA, PhD). She currently has a consulting practice in pediatric audiology. Her 40+ years of experience ranges from Deaf Nursery programs to positions at the League for the Hard of Hearing (Director), Long Island College Hospital, Downstate Medical Center, Beth Israel Medical Center, and New York Eye and Ear Infirmary as director of the Hearing and Learning Center and Cochlear Implant Center. Madell's clinical and research interests cover the evaluation and treatment for infants and children with hearing loss and auditory processing disorders. 

Jane Shann is an experienced teacher of the deaf who has had a hearing loss herself from birth. She has worked in both education and health care, and now runs The Phoenix Group for Deaf Children, which is a charity in the UK for deaf and hearing-impaired children and their families. Jane is passionate about enabling deaf children to achieve their potential and believes that a crucial part of this is enabling others to understand the personal impact that hearing loss has upon children, young people and adults.

Janet Trychin, Au.D., specializes in early intervention and in-home services for children with hearing loss from birth to three and their families. She is an adjunct professor at Edinburgh University in the Speech, Language and Hearing Department. Janet has become especially interested in the helpfulness in the use of videos for families and other professionals.

Joy F. Rosenberg, M.Ed., MSc., is a Clinical Scientist in Audiology and a Teacher of the Deaf. She has spent three decades in a variety of positions in America, Asia, and Europe. Joy now works in Higher Education at Mary Hare Training services affiliated to Oxford Brookes University and University of Hertfordshire, where her interests revolve around working in partnership with families and clients.

Karen Anderson, PhD, is an educational and pediatric audiologist. She is the director of Supporting Success for Children with Hearing Loss, providing online resources for professionals and parents of children with hearing loss.

Lindsey Jones works as a peripatetic Teacher of the Deaf at South Tyneside Hearing Impaired Service, UK. Lindsey has an interest in how science is taught to children with hearing loss. She is especially interested in looking at ways to develop scientific argumentation and reasoning with deaf children.

Naomi Russell is a Specialist Audiologist at Nottingham Audiology Services in the UK. Her clinical specialty is audiological rehabilitation in children and adults. Naomi is currently engaged in research with the National Biomedical Research Unit on the effect of using the Ida Motivation Tools in an NHS clinic. She also won the BAA Audiologist of the year award in 2012 for going above and beyond with care.

Paul Peryman is the Senior Paediatric Audiologist at the van Asch Deaf Education Centre in Christchurch, New Zealand. He is educated in New Zealand and England, with two degrees in Psychology and a Post-Grad Diploma in Audiology from the University of Melbourne. Paul has clinical, educational, and mentoring roles within Central and Southern New Zealand, and advisory roles within the Ministries of Health and Education. Paul's present clinical interest lies in the counseling support of parents of newly diagnosed and very young hearing impaired children.