Uber aims to put more deaf drivers on the roads  

 

Wendell Pratt can’t hear what his Uber passengers say about him, but he is used to reading their reactions when they learn he is deaf.
Some stare at him through his rearview mirror; others check their phones to make sure they have the correct driver, or pull up their own set of directions to follow. And one man who climbed into Pratt’s 2012 Toyota Prius a few months ago couldn’t hide what Pratt took as apprehension.
“He kept looking at me,” said Pratt, 45, of Frederick, Md. “He was very short and standoffish. It was his attitude I could see.”
For Pratt, an Uber driver who has been deaf since infancy, it’s not unusual for passengers to express astonishment at the idea of a hearing-impaired driver. But the majority are friendly — none more than a rider’s boxer who hopped in one day and greeted Pratt with a lick to the face.
A new initiative would put many more like Pratt on the roads.
Uber is teaming with a leading nonprofit group for the deaf to attract more hearing-impaired drivers, the company announced Tuesday. Already, the company says, hundreds of drivers who are hard of hearing are picking up fares for Uber in the Washington region.

This is is a good development for individuals with hearing difficulty..

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