New York State Senator Jim Gaughran made a $500,000 donation to Mill Neck Manor School for the Deaf today. Gaughran—who stood alongside Mill Neck Mayor Peter Quick and Superintendent of Mill Neck Manor School for the Deaf Fran Bogdanoff in a gymnasium full of grateful students—has always been a supporter of Mill Neck’s mission to create a world where Deaf and Hard of Hearing children and adults are included, empowered, celebrated and embraced as equals.
“This is really the most important investment that New York can make,” Gaughran said to News 12 Long Island. “The students here at Mill Neck can really do so much in the community and have successful careers. By getting them out there and able to contend with their hearing peers is not only the right thing to do, it’s extremely important.”
The generous donation will be used to create extracurricular activities for students, including sports; hands-on learning classes like cooking, job readiness and life skills; computers; dance and more; as well as American Sign Language (ASL) classes for parents. It will also be used to purchase a van for transportation for students who live too far away to join after school activities or whose school districts can’t transport them.
By opening up the doors after school for students to utilize important socialization skills, and for parents to learn ASL to communicate more clearly with their children, Mill Neck can continue to create an extension of the safe school environment that students crave so deeply. There is also an opportunity for parents to feel involved in their child’s life in a way they haven’t before.
“After school activities are so important for our students to gain independence and feel socially accepted and included,” said Bogdanoff. “We want to get our parents more involved. If they don’t know ASL, that’s OK! We will teach them. We want them to know that we are here for them and want to help.”
Mill Neck sends a warmhearted thank you to Senator Jim Gaughran, because without our generous supporters, such as yourself, we would not exist.
For more information on how to donate, visit www.millneck.org/donate.