LITTLE ROCK, Ark., April 21 /PRNewswire/ -- A year ago at the Presidents'
Summit for America's Future the call went out across the country to increase
the number of volunteers and volunteer hours devoted to youth.  A year later,
many companies, organizations and people have answered the call.
    There are many outstanding examples of volunteers who have stepped up, but
in the state of Arkansas there may not be a better one than Little Rock's
Ernest Northup and his work with the deaf community.  Northup, a UPS employee,
has been deaf since he was six months old and has dedicated his adult life to
bringing an awareness of deaf people and their special needs to the attention
of society.
    -- Northup serves as the president of the Arkansas Association of the
       Deaf.
    -- He serves as a board member of the Little Rock Association of the
       Deaf and is a member of the Little Rock Deaf Community Center.
    -- Northup is a governor-appointed member of the Arkansas Deaf and
    -- Hearing Impaired Telecommunications Service Corporation (ADHITS).
    -- This organization works closely with the Arkansas Relay Services to
       ensure quality in telephone relay services for deaf Arkansans.
    -- Northup helped to establish the Telecommunications Assistance
       Program (TAP), which purchases and disseminates teletext devices
       (TTDs) to deaf people across the state according to financial need.
    -- Through his work with a deaf community group, Northup became
       involved in a ministry to the Honduran deaf community and has made
       five mission trips to the capital city.  Through this program, he
       has helped to provide medical care, assisted in carpentry projects,
       conducted sign language workshops for teachers in Honduran public
       schools and helped to establish a local association for the deaf.
    -- He and other deaf leaders have met with local television stations
       to successfully convince them of the need for real-time closed
       captioning for news broadcasts and emergency warnings.
    -- Northup is the 1996 winner of the Jim Casey Casey Community Service
       Award, UPS's internal award for outstanding employee volunteers,
       named after the company's founder.

    Please call the listed contacts if you are interested in speaking with
Northup or hearing about UPS' Neighbor-to-Neighbor Program, which matches
employees willing to volunteer with local agencies.  Also available is
information on the results of a national survey on volunteerism sponsored by
The UPS Foundation.

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