Mariella Paulino

I'm a hard of hearing Latina woman from the Bronx. I lost my hearing at the age of 7 after emigrating to the US from the Dominican Republic. In this new country I was confronted with not just a new language, a new culture, and a new home, but also my hearing loss. Thanks to the support of many MANY MANY organizations and people I have met along the way, I went on to college (NYU!) and recently received my MA from Georgetown.

I have been honored to work for some great organizations (Department of Defense and Congress). Currently I am working for Code for Progress and building my app (ProjectHearing.com) on the side which I am launching in a few weeks. The focus of my career right now is to create resources for members of the deaf and hard of hearing community to find tools to navigate a hearing world that isn't always accommodating to them. At Code for Progress I am working on Latin@s En Tech, which is building a community to help Latin@s become involved in tech in the DC area. With Project Hearing, I am also attempting to achieve a similar goal by getting hard of hearing people to use tech. I'm excited to talk about either of these topics and have talks prepared for both!