GDA Trustee wins regional ‘Specsavers’ award
GDA supporter and Trustee is recognised for her work supporting the local deaf community and outstanding charity work
Jackie Gloyn, a Trustee and supporter of Gloucestershire Deaf Association (and a member of SI Cirencester & District) has been selected as one of 10 regional finalists in the Specsavers Sound Barrier Star Awards, a UK-wide competition to find people who have triumphed despite their own hearing difficulties.
Jackie’s story was chosen as the most inspirational in the region for her work with a huge number of organisations and charities. Jackie, who herself lives with severe hearing loss, is not only a trustee of GDA and single handedly raised money to set up the Cirencester Deaf Children’s Club (CDCC) and Cirencester Hard of Hearing Club, she has also been a district organiser for Women’s Royal Voluntary Service (WRVS) organising meals on wheels, been a governor of Kingshill School, is involved with her local branch of Soroptimist and has raised thousands of pounds for charities including Marie Curie in Cirencester.
It wasn’t until her early 50’s that Jackie noticed a problem with her hearing and wore both analogue and digital hearing aids before the loss became so bad that she became eligible for a cochlear implant. She underwent the operation in October 2012.
“I was absolutely delighted when I found out I’d been chosen as a regional finalist,” says Jackie. “I get a huge amount of reward and happiness from the work that I do, but to be recognised for it with this award is just brilliant.”
“I started to lose my hearing relatively late in life after I noticed difficulty taking the minutes during a Soroptimist meeting. While hearing aids certainly helped, as it deteriorated, it became much harder. I’m now severely deaf so the cochlear implant has really transformed things.”
Jackie was nominated by her friend and colleague, Jenny Hopkins, Chief Executive at GDA.
“The cochlear implant has made such a huge difference to Jackie’s life – I now find myself have to readjust the way I speak to her as before I needed to talk quite slowly to aid her lip-reading,” says Jenny. “We have many wonderful volunteers at GDA, but Jackie was an obvious choice for me to nominate for the Sound Barrier Star Award for the quite amazing amount of fundraising and other charitable work she does, but also because she continues to do it despite the serious communication problems she herself faces every day due to deafness. She was also a carer for her elderly husband until he passed away earlier this year.”
Ten regional finalists have been chosen from across the UK and five will be invited to the national final in October in London. The Sound Barrier Star of 2013 will win a week long villa holiday for two people in the Mediterranean, including flights, courtesy of VillaParade. On top of this, they will also receive a £1,500 hearcare or £500 optic voucher from Specsavers.
(Kindly reproduced from the GDA website:
Click here)
