Cate Crowley took a group of students and professionals to provide therapy and professional development with the Healing the Children cleft palate surgical mission in Neiva, Colombia. The Healing the Children mission differs from traditional cleft palate missions because the team returns every year to provide ongoing surgery, treatment and therapy to the same patients each year. During this last mission, 166 hours of therapy were provided in group and individual sessions to patients working with Healing the Children. This year Cate developed an idea to create books in Spanish that would help children with repaired cleft palates to improve their speech. Cate oversaw development and supported the books that were written by Angela Giraldo and illustrated by Tina Yeung. These books, in Spanish, focus on specific high pressure sounds that are at the same place of articulation. For example some books focus on t, d and n while others focus on p, b and m. These books were given to all the surgeons and fonoaudiologists (speech therapists) working with patients from the Healing the Children mission. In addition, small format versions of the books were given to all the patients so that they would have fun and interesting materials that they could use to practice their sounds.
In a disability evaluation, we ask a child to point “to the triangle” or “to the author” as part of test developed to identify disorder. An evaluator who uses this kind of test to identify disability must assume that all children being evaluated have had similar exposure to “triangle” and “author” including similar family, cultural, and educational experiences. It follows then, that if a child cannot identify “triangle” or “author” it is because that child has some kind of learning problem. But what if a child does not have a disability but simply did not have the same 
Our second day in Ghana began with the continuation of our work at the Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital with Ghana’s beloved speech therapist, Albert Osei-Bagyina. The sweltering heat went unnoticed as our morning filled up with young children and their dedicated parents. One man shared that he had left home at 1 am that morning, taking half a day’s trek to wait with his 3 year old daughter until we were able to see him at 2 pm. We were determined to give the highest standard of care while seeing as many patients as possible. The day ended on a successful note with our three separate groups providing recommendations to parents of 21 children in under five hours.
Today was our first day at Komfo Anokye Teaching Hospital. The teaching hospital is located in Kumasi, Ghana. When we arrived we met Albert Osei-Bagyina, the only speech therapist who works at the hospital. The faculty at Teachers College created English and Twi versions of the Osei-Bagyina Test of Articulation (OBTAT) and gave it to Albert. These two assessments will further aid clincians in Ghana in determining the strengths and weaknesses in the articulation of children who speak English and/or Twi.
