Matthew Detgen, greeting his parents, Marie and Don Detgen, at Back-to-School Night.

Many of Matheny’s students and patients are non-verbal. To help them communicate, teachers and therapists provide them with state-of-the-art assistive technology, including a variety of augmentative and alternative communications systems. Thanks to a recent donation by The Friends of Matheny, the Matheny School has a brand new supply of augmentative communication switches, which can be used by students to express themselves.

One of the recent beneficiaries of this gift was Matthew Detgen, a non-verbal student who was able to work as a greeter at the Matheny School’s Back-to-School Night. Stationed in the main lobby, Detgen activated switches that said: “Welcome to Back-to-School Night” and “I’m Glad You Could Make It.”

As part of a collaborative team, speech-language pathologists and teachers work together to complete assessments of speech and language and develop and implement programs to meet each student’s individual needs.