tells Arlington ISD<\/a> that he entered the program determined to prove himself. He said rather than focusing on limitations, he focused on showing coaches and teammates who he was through his work ethic and commitment.<\/p>\n\u201cBy showing up every day to workouts, showing them that I wanted to play football and really wanted to be in the program,\u201d he said, \u201cI could show people who I really am.\u201d<\/p>\n
On the field, Phifer works with sign language interpreter Tori Talora, who stands on the sidelines to give him sign language hand signals so he can know the play calls. She has been with Kaleb for many years and has helped him build confidence in the game.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey gave me a chance, and they gave Kaleb a chance. They respect him, and he\u2019s such a key part of this team,” Talor said. “I think a lot of kids struggle with believing in themselves. Seeing him make that first big hit and seeing that smile on his face was special.\u201d<\/p>\n
Once he felt comfortable enough during his football career, Phifer started wearing a cochlear implant connected to a microphone worn by coaches, which allows him to receive instruction and communicate more effectively during games.<\/p>\n
\u201cIf I miss a play call, I just look on the sideline,\u201d Phifer said. \u201cI tell one of my teammates the play call is back, and then we go.\u201d<\/p>\n
His dedication has made such an impact that he recently received ten college scholarship offers to continue playing football. After he graduates high school in the spring, his goal is to play football in college while earning a business degree.<\/p>\n
\u201cDon\u2019t let anybody tell you what to do just because you\u2019re deaf or because of a disability that you have,\u201d Phifer said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"An Arlington ISD football player is defying the odds and proving that what makes him different does not…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":478282,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[150,152,151,5262],"class_list":["post-478281","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arlington","tag-arlington","tag-arlington-headlines","tag-arlington-news","tag-something-good"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/478281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=478281"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/478281\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/478282"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=478281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=478281"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=478281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}