Technology has changed significantly over the more than 75 years the Center for Disability Services has helped individuals with disabilities.

At the Kevin G. Langan School, it's opened new doors for nonverbal students like Maya, who was diagnosed with cerebral palsy when she was 5 months old.

Maya works with her speech language pathologist, Kathy Lewis, using a speech-generating device to talk.

“Maya can say a lot of words, but she can’t say enough to meet all of her great communication and expression that she can do,” said Lewis.

Instead of saying the sentences herself, she uses a tablet device to select words that are read automatically out loud.

Before this year, Maya only had access to 15 buttons, each displaying a word or short phrase. Now, she’s working with 42.

“It makes things a lot easier for us to be able to ask her, 'Maya what would you like? Maya, how do you feel about that?' And then she’s able to communicate with us,” said Audrey Vasquez, Maya’s mom.

It’s something she does a lot. Maya is known for being opinionated, and the device allows her to advocate for herself, especially during activities like physical therapy.

“In physical therapy, a lot of times, we are talking about things that might hurt. Things that might be hard. So giving her a device that offers her that vocabulary is really helpful as a therapist, because then she can better tell me what she needs during her sessions,” said Abbey Schuck, a physical therapist who works closely with Maya.

The Center for Disability Services expects the technology to continue to evolve and open more doors for students like Maya. That’s something her family is thankful for.

“To be able to hear Maya say, ‘I’m sad, I want a hug.’ Those are things that a parent wants to hear from a child. 'I love you,' those kinds of things. It means a lot to us because those things are things we never thought we’d hear her say,” Vasquez said.