The response to our Gift of Speech Holiday Appeal 2021 is truly amazing and we are only half way through December! As a result, we have expanded our campaign goal to remove 25 more children from the waitlist. We are enormously excited that this has become a possibility and SEND A HUGE THANK YOU to our caring donors so far! 

Many children have speech deficits that can limit their future and it is critical to provide support as early as possible. Reach Child and Youth Development Society provides speech therapy to children with complex development needs and also uses augmentative tools like iPads that help children communicate for the first time.

Gift of Speech 2021 highlights Nicole’s journey with REACH. She came to us early  in 2018 when she had just turned 3 as a little girl who understood little language and who rarely used words to communicate. When she graduated from the under 6 program, she was communicating verbally using words and short phrases and was using the ipad to learn to use longer sentences. Nicole is now in the over 6 program and continues to make progress with her language, academic and self-help skills. 

Speech therapy assesses and supports issues related to communication development in children. Areas of development include: production and sequencing of speech sounds, learning words and putting them together to produce phrases and sentences, understanding questions and following directions, social communication skills, fluency or stuttering, voice  disorders, hearing loss, and, alternative and augmentative communications needs. Augmentative tools like iPads can give children a voice for the first time!

Warner Bros. Superman & Lois kicked off this year’s Gift of Speech campaign with a donation of 120 hours of speech therapy. Join Superman & Lois in supporting REACH and giving the gift of speech to a family this holiday season.  Be a real-life superhero and help parents who think their child may never be able to communicate them by providing their children with speech therapy at REACH.  Your gift of $50 will allow one child to receive a speech therapy session – and 10 sessions are enough to make a meaningful difference to a family. 

In addition, Envision Financial has matched an additional $5000 in donations when we reached $10,000! “Every child deserves the support they need,” says Dave Lanphear, president of Envision Financial. “As a financial cooperative, we’re honoured to have the opportunity to positively impact the lives of the children in our community through the REACH Gift of Speech program and encourage you to do the same.”

Because of community support, help is within REACH! Thank you for considering giving the Gift of Speech this holiday season!!