Teresa Vu-Fountain

Teresa Vu-Fountain joined A Shared Vision as an intern in 2023.  She completed her endorsement in Special Education – Early Childhood Visual Impairment from the University of Utah in 2024 and is now supporting A Shared Vision's families with IFSP vision services.

Teresa received her master’s degree in Early Childhood Unified from the University of Kansas in 2014. From 2015 to 2021 she was a lead Early Intervention Service Coordinator at Foothills Gateway, Inc., in Fort Collins, where she loved learning about families’ backgrounds and needs and ensuring they were receiving individualized and appropriate resources.

Teresa found deep empathy for the families she supported because of her own experience as a parent of two children with special needs. Born four weeks early, her son needed support with feeding and motor skills. Two years later, her daughter developed nystagmus and was diagnosed with a form of albinism. “This sparked my interest in becoming an Early Intervention Teacher of the Visually Impaired. I knew that my understanding of how it felt to be a parent in this situation better prepared me to support families in early intervention. I could relate to the joys and hardships they felt,” explains Teresa.

Her approach to early intervention is holistic. “Every family comes from diverse backgrounds with different values,” explains Teresa. “That means that early intervention supports are not one size fits all! Services should be individualized and agreed on together. Let’s all talk and work together to find the best strategies for the child and integrate them into the awesome things that the family already does.”

For Teresa, those “awesome things” include playing games, exploring outside, and sharing her love of cooking, music, and even her favorite animal, the platypus.