April 26, 2011

Nora Griffin-Shirley Gives to Keep Her Research Passion Alive

Spend a few minutes with Nora Griffin-Shirley, Ph.D., and you’ll start to think about the world in a different way.

A professor in the college of education, Griffin-Shirley is director of the Virginia Murray Sowell Center for Research and Education in Sensory Disabilities where she and her staff prepare professionals to work with children and adults with a wide range of visual and hearing impairments, including deaf-blindness.

Through Griffin-Shirley’s eyes, you begin to understand the unique challenges that everyday life brings to people who are deaf, blind or deaf-blind.

But it was Larry Hovey, Ph.D., an associate professor in the College of Education, who helped Griffin-Shirley see how she could leave a legacy that would continue to help people who are deaf, blind or deaf-blind lead independent lives.