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Front Row: Cassidy Blanchard, Allyson Rees, Nidellyn Armendariz, Marquis Borjas, Elyse Busby, Alissa Seisser, Khate Solis, Karla Perez, Kyda Gossen; back row: Sebastian Diosdado, Jalen Gunter, Chandlar Perzanowski, Dr. Lisa Boggs, Tara Bushong, Britteny Heine, Robert Pigg. Photo courtesy of Sarah Hirschman.
Recently the seniors from both the morning and afternoon Western Technology Center-Biomedical Academy program had the privilege to listen to an excellent guest speaker. This guest speaker was Dr. Lisa Boggs. She has an abundance of accomplishments under her belt and is even a biological sciences professor at Southwestern Oklahoma State University.
Although Dr. Boggs is an excellent person and has accomplished extraordinary things, there was something else that made her special. Dr.Boggs has lived most of her life almost fully deaf, she used to wear hearing aids but there was only so much hearing aids could do for her. She was given the opportunity to get a cochlear implant to improve her hearing.
A cochlear implant is a surgically implanted neuroprosthetic device that provides a sense of sound to a person with moderate to profound sensorineural hearing loss. Cochlear implants bypass damaged portions of the ear and directly stimulate the auditory nerve. Signals generated by the implant are sent by way of the auditory nerve to the brain, which recognizes the signals as sound.
Although the early stages of a cochlear implant were tough, Dr.Boggs fought through and it ended up being one of the best decisions of her life. She is now completely deaf without the implant and says the implant helped her hearing more than she could have ever imagined.
In class, seniors were learning about what a cochlear implant was and how it works. By talking to Dr.Boggs it gave everyone an idea of all the benefits that come with the device and just exactly how much of a difference it can make in someone’s life.
Dr. Boggs was an inspiration to all of the students, the way she overcame numerous obstacles in her life and was able to do what she loves despite the circumstances. She was full of energy and so open to answering all the questions we had. I believe all of the Biomed students learned a lot from this learning activity and we are glad that Dr.Boggs took the time to speak with our class.
In the WTC-Biomedical Academy program, students investigate the roles of biomedical professionals as they study the concepts of human medicine, physiology, genetics, microbiology, and public health. The Biomedical Academy is open to college-bound juniors and seniors.