This college student has been going above and beyond the call of duty to protect people who are deaf or hard of hearing from risking exposure to COVID-19.

Since the world has been struggling to cope with N95 face mask shortages, 21-year-old Ashley Lawrence has been troubled by how the face masks might prevent people with hearing disabilities from communicating.

Because American Sign Language (ASL) speakers rely heavily on lip-reading for grammar, face masks could obscure up to half of a person's message.

Lawrence, who studies education for the deaf and hard of hearing at Eastern Kentucky University, has been conducting her schooling at home due to the novel coronavirus outbreaks—so she resolved to use her free time in quarantine to make face masks for sign language speakers.

With the help of her mother, Lawrence began sewing face masks with plastic windows over the wearer's mouth so that ASL speakers could still use lip-reading for communication.

Over the course of the last few weeks, Lawrence has been shipping the masks to dozens of hospitals and deaf individuals for free. She launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise funds for shipping, handling, and materials, but she deactivated the crowdfunding page after she reached her goal of $3,300 in just two days.

Although Lawrence had originally recruited a team of volunteers to make the masks for deaf people in her home community of Woodford County, Kentucky, the determined college student is now working to launch an official Facebook page and website for her newly-dubbed DHH Mask Project as a means of meeting demand for the masks.

Furthermore, Lawrence plans on posting a YouTube DIY instructional video for making the masks by the end of this week. Until then, people can request a set of free masks from Lawrence by emailing her at [email protected].

This is just one of many positive stories and updates that are coming out of the COVID-19 news coverage this week. For more uplifting coverage on the outbreaks, click here.

(WATCH the news coverage below)

Help Your Friends Hear About The Inspiring Initiative By Sharing This To Social Media…