A Family Tradition: Four Hearing Children, One School

For Cameron Taylor, age 10, enrolling at Tucker-Maxon is fulfilling a family tradition. All four typically-hearing Taylor brothers – Troy, Travis, Cameron, and Tucker – have attended the school.

Cameron has two cats and wants to be a veterinarian when he is older. His favorite subjects are science and social studies; he notes that he likes to “write about presidents.” He also enjoys baseball and Legos.

In 2001, Cameron’s mother, Lynda, was looking for a school for his older brothers, twins Troy and Travis. She wanted small classrooms and a low student-teacher ratio for her first graders because she felt that her children would need individual attention to thrive.

Later, when Troy was diagnosed with ADHD, Lynda was especially grateful that he was not in a classroom with “25 to 30 kids in rows of desks all the time.” She said that Tucker-Maxon offers “a lot of flexibility within the class structure,” to students’ advantage. When younger brother Cameron and later Tucker needed a school, Lynda chose Tucker-Maxon again.

Enrolling her four hearing sons in classrooms with deaf and hard-of-hearing children has other advantages, Lynda said. “That’s not the reason they came here but that has certainly been a benefit. Troy and Travis used to help test batteries for their classmates’ implants. They loved helping them. The experience has opened their eyes to help them see kids with impairments as normal.”

Lynda appreciates the sense of connection between faculty and families. “Sometimes when I pick up my children, a teacher will say, ‘Guess what your son did today?’ They are very enthusiastic about the students.”
“Tucker-Maxon is able to embrace the diversity of children and their needs in a very intuitive and caring way so they help give students opportunities to succeed, regardless of the individual issues they bring.”

Cameron said he enjoyed having his older brothers on campus last year, before they graduated from the fifth grade and enrolled at Holy Family School, because they all were able to play together at school. At the Thanksgiving Feast, “We were able to invite four people because there were four of us. My parents and my grandparents got to come.”

When asked why he likes attending Tucker-Maxon, Cameron said, “There are lots of good people here.” --Laura Sanders