VIDEO: Deaf, blind students enjoy special kind of egg hunt

Shakira Cordona's joyful screams were so high-pitched today that she could barely hear the beeping Easter eggs that were spread in a field before her.

"Over there," she yelled to her teacher who was holding her hand. "No, over here."

She leaned over, felt around the grass for a moment and lifted up a beeping pink plastic egg.

"I found it," she yelled, holding the egg into the air and smiling.

Shakira, 9, is a student at the Colorado School for the Deaf and Blind. Despite less than ideal weather, she and her other blind classmates were having fun today at an Easter egg hunt just for them.

Instead of normal eggs, volunteers from Qwest Pioneers - a group of Qwest employees dedicated to volunteer work - made an Easter egg hunt from beeping plastic eggs.

About 20 eggs were spread in a school field. When students found them, they traded them in for plastic eggs filled with jelly beans.

Deaf students at the school had their own egg hunt in a nearby field with the candy-filled eggs.

The beeping eggs were handmade in Denver by other Qwest Pioneers. They were based on a 1964 invention of a beeping softball created so the blind could play.

"We just adapted it to Easter eggs," said Joyce Robbins, president of the local chapter of Qwest Pioneers. This is the third year the pioneers have hosted an egg hunt at the school. Similar egg hunts were hosted in Denver, Grand Junction and the other states to which Qwest provides service.

"Our students just love it," said Amy Gunning, an elementary teacher at the school. She said that she has had a hard time in the past week keeping the kids calm enough to do their school work.

"They were just so excited," she said.

After the egg hunt, students went into the school and the Qwest Pioneers gave them Easter baskets filled with a stuffed animal, popcorn balls, fruit snacks and chocolate.

Kissy Gray, a volunteer for the event, said she was just excited to help out.

"It's so much fun," she said. "But mainly I'm here so blind children can enjoy something that their siblings and other sighted kids do."

Shakira wasn't letting her blindness affect her on Thursday. She raced from egg to egg and quickly picked up five -- the maximum the students were allowed. She said that she was an excellent egg hunter.

"I can hear really, really well," she said.
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