For 35 years and counting, Candi Bown has spent her career helping kids with hearing loss as Nebo School District’s audiologist.

The impact she’s made on the hundreds, if not thousands, of students she’s treated may be difficult to quantify, but it has not gone unrecognized.

Bown’s peers celebrated her work by nominating her as the Utah Speech-Language Hearing Association’s School Clinician of the Year. She was honored with the award on Feb. 28.

It was a shock to receive, Bown said, because the award typically goes to speech-language therapists. She was honored her coworkers thought so highly of her.

It also gave her a chance to reflect on the biggest reward of her career: seeing students’ growth.

“I love the fact that I get to see kids throughout all of their education,” Bown said. “I get to see them progress all the way until they graduate, and most of the time that’s really, really happy times. I get to see some great progress.”

Bown’s impact

Hearing impairments are not always as apparent as sight or speech disabilities and are sometimes difficult to catch. Receiving treatment can make a world of a difference, though.

Inside her Springville office Monday morning, Bown sifted through her computer to find a first-hand account.

“It’s like being in a dimly lit room, and then turning on the lights; everything seems to glow suddenly,” she read aloud from a student’s reflection. “I can hear the tiny background noises, the birds singing outside my window, the rustling in the wind blowing through the trees. Like being in a dimly lit room, your eyes seem to adjust to the light, and you forget about it. But when the light switch is flipped on, suddenly shapes and colors come clear. Little details pop out. Hearing aids remove the barrier between you and the world.”

“Pretty powerful stuff, huh?” Bown said.

The number of kids that need such life-altering assistance within the district has only increased in the last three decades.

When Bown started her job in 1990, shortly after receiving her master’s degree in audiology from Utah State University, there were three high schools in the district and far fewer students. She’d sometimes go years without diagnosing a kid with a hearing loss.

Now, Bown, who earned a doctoral degree in audiology in 2005, makes a diagnosis every week. She said there are currently 235 kids in the district with hearing loss, and the number seems to grow every year.

“I don’t know if we’re getting better at our job, better at catching them, or just the sheer number of kids we have in the district nowadays, but I think that’s the biggest change,” Bown said. “My job has been kind of fun to watch evolve. I’ve been able to really build this program from the ground up. And I really like what we’re doing, and that includes the (speech-language pathologists), the teachers of the deaf, and myself all together. That’s our team. And I think we’ve done a great job.”

Amid the growth, her example within the department has left an impression on those around her.

“I have many images in mind of worried parents’ burdens lifted, of students suddenly hearing clearly, and of IEP teams so relieved that Candi has come to the rescue,” Nebo speech-language pathology specialist Lorie Reese said in a press release. “She has gone above and beyond serving on hundreds of IEP teams helping students be properly aided or fitted with cochlear implants and having the classroom accommodations they need to be successful.”

On the job

Bown works four days a week, spending Tuesdays and Thursdays in her office conducting hearing screenings, doing full diagnostic batteries and performing auditory processing testing, among other things.

On Mondays and Wednesdays, she visits schools, fixing issues with hearing aids and working with the kids. A priority of hers is making students feel comfortable wearing the aids.

Some kids — especially in junior high and high school — are resistant to wearing them. Bown acknowledged kids can be mean sometimes, and some students are embarrassed to wear the aids in class.

She said this stubbornness can be heartbreaking to see, though.

“That’s the part that makes my job sad, is when I know they can benefit from it,” Bown said. “I know they’re sitting in a classroom and they can’t hear everything they need to. They’re working twice as hard as other kids in the classroom, but somehow, I just can’t convince them.”

She does everything she can to help students feel comfortable wearing them. A method she uses more frequently with younger students is often effective.

When young children first receive hearing aids, Bown will conduct a class presentation to help classmates understand what’s happening. She’ll allow them to listen to the aids and ask questions, even encouraging the student with the hearing aids to answer some questions themselves.

“They go, ‘Yeah, these are my hearing aids. They’re cool. I love them. What questions do you have?'” Bown said. “The biggest thing that I love to work on with kids is their self-advocacy. I want them to feel good about themselves, be okay with the fact that they wear hearing aids because it’s no different than me having to wear glasses because I can’t see very well, and I like to educate kids about that.”

That time in the classroom helps students embrace their hearing aids as “superpowers,” according to Nebo Hearing Specialist Katrina Davenport.

Bown operates with such charm that kids gravitate toward her. “Her approachable demeanor and genuine care have earned the admiration of students, who often greet her with enthusiasm,” Davenport said.

Bown insists she has the best job in the world, and no matter how often people ask her if a change is in the future, she has no plans of going anywhere.