Guest Blogger

Teacher

Ocean City, New Jersey

Amy Andersen found her passion in American Sign Language and her inspiration as an educator in the deaf community. In 2004, Amy founded the American Sign Language program at Ocean City High School with 42 students. With Amy’s leadership, the district now offers ASL 1-4  to over 200 students.

Amy, the 2018 NJ Teacher of the Year and National Finalist is also a National Board Certified teacher. She has been recognized by the National Education Association, the American Sign Language Teachers Association and was honored with the 2018 Evangelina Menendez Trailblazer Award. She has been instrumental in promoting state legislation to ensure language accessibility for deaf children in NJ (LEAD-K, Deaf Child Bill of Rights). After she successfully pioneered an innovative approach to early intervention with deaf babies, Leveling the Playing Field, the NJ Division of Deaf and Hard of Hearing was given over $1,000,000  to expand this program and reach deaf children throughout the state.

Currently, Amy is the co-chair of the NJDOE Deaf Education Advisory Committee, a member of NJDOE Language Acquisition task force for Deaf children and regularly consults as a deaf education/ ASL specialist with Educational Testing Services. Amy has built her work on the foundation that every voice has value and every child has the human right to communicate.