DEPARTMENT OF COMMUNICATIVE DISORDERS
Mission
The Department of Communicative Disorders at The University of Alabama exists to create and disseminate evidence-based information for the provision of the highest quality 1) education for undergraduate and graduate students, 2) clinical services for individuals in need, and 3) research for the advancement of the fields of audiology and speech-language pathology.
Vision
Our vision is to be the Southeast’s premier educational program for training in the fields of audiology and speech-language pathology; to build a world-class learning environment that promotes the discovery, dissemination, and adoption of evidence-based practices to advance the practice of audiology and speech-language pathology.
Spring 2024 NEWSLETTER
A Note from the Department Chair
Welcome to the Spring 2024 semester. We are looking forward to a semester full of growth & celebrations. We’ve got Honors’ Day coming up in April, followed by graduation for the class of 2024 in May. We are celebrating all the work and accomplishments that our department has achieved already during this academic year. UACDc/o25 just successfully completed their first semester of graduate school. They now have the confidence and experience to have an even better second semester. UACDc/o24 has successfully completed their academic program. They have four semesters of clinical experiences to build upon as they head into their full-time 5th semester clinical placement.
Our students continue to drive innovation in our department. We just completed a trial of separating clinic and class responsibilities during the Fall 2023 semester. This semester, we will continue our trial of separating class and clinic responsibilities and for the first time- there will be no night class for our graduate students!! All of this was inspired by student feedback and our recent Academic Program Review, which gave us the time and tools to take a deep dive into both our undergraduate and graduate program.
Our clinical educators are expanding outpatient services in our clinic to include dynamic voice and swallowing assessment and treatment. We are partnering with other programs on campus to make sure that we are offering the services needed in our community. This provides terrific clinical training opportunities for our graduate students and state of the art care for the people of West Alabama—fulfilling our mission to create and disseminate evidence-based information for the provision of the highest quality 1) education for undergraduate and graduate students, 2) clinical services for individuals in need, and 3) research for the advancement of the fields of audiology and speech-language pathology.
We have now completed the self-study and the site visit that were part of the Academic Program Review (APR) and will continue to use the results of the APR to drive innovation in the coming semesters. This is the first semester since Dr. Payne and I began our leadership roles in the department that we aren’t engaged in significant preparation for an external review. Maybe this means we’ll have a less stressful start to this new year! I hope all of you will find time in this season of “newness” to reflect on all the accomplishments of the past year and build on the success of the past as you launch confidently towards your goals for 2024! If you’re in Tuscaloosa, I hope you’ll come by for a visit and let us show you all the new and exciting things that are happening here.
Welcome from the Clinic Director
Welcome to Spring 2024!
I hope everyone had a wonderful holiday season. We are gearing up for the new semester here at the Speech and Hearing Center and are welcoming back our 1st year graduate students who are ready to begin classes and their new clinical rotations. Our clinical faculty have been very busy this year as we work to reorganize and expand our services, particularly in the areas of voice and adult dysphagia. We are excited for the students to have the opportunity to get experience working with these populations.
Our 2nd year graduate students are set to begin their last semester working full-time at their externship sites and I am confident they will do a great job and learn a lot. All of us here would like to say how much we value and appreciate all of our incredible off-campus clinical educators. You give so much of your time and knowledge and are indispensable to the students’ educational and professional development. We are so honored to work with you.
I will also mention that our fantastic team of clinical educators here at UA will be presenting the ASHA required clinical supervision course for clinical educators at this year’s SHAA Convention held in Birmingham on February 8th-9th. If you are interested in becoming an off-campus clinical educator, or just want to hear ideas from a different perspective, please consider attending this presentation.
As always, Roll Tide!
Fall 2023 Events
Alabama Dysphagia Collective Conference 2023
The 2023 Alabama Dysphagia Collective (ADC) Conference was held September 29 & 30 in Tuscaloosa. Conference Co-Directors, Kendrea Garand and Memorie Gosa, along with ADC founding members, Grayson Hill, Kalea Jones, and Sarah Szynkiewicz, welcomed conference attendees invested in their work with patients who have dysphagia. ADC Conference topics included Assessment and Treatment Strategies Utilizing Case-Based Learning in Adult and Pediatric Dysphagia. Nationally recognized speakers included Lauren Tabor Gray, Janina Wilmskoetter, Duane Trahan, Brianna Miluk, Kara Larson, and Pamela Dodrill.
Halloween Costume Contest
ASHA Convention 2023
Gratitude CE Event
Student Spotlight
Julia Ray
Julia is a senior at The University of Alabama from Prosper, Texas. She is a Communicative Disorders and French double-major. Julia wants to make a difference in the world by eliminating barriers in the healthcare system by advocating for patients' needs to ensure inclusive and accessible hearing healthcare.
Julia's favorite class has been CD 345, Introduction to Audiology Lab Experience. She enjoyed observing the variety of audiology settings as well as clinical services such as hearing evaluations, hearing aid fittings, tinnitus management, newborn hearing assessments, and positional vertigo treatment. During this class, she gained hands-on experience completing hearing screenings with patients. Julia said, "it was inspiring to hear each patient's story and discover firsthand the impact of audiology in improving their hearing ability and their quality of life."
Julia shared "My grandmother was diagnosed with sensorineural hearing loss in her early thirties, and she has worn a cochlear implant for many years. Although her hearing loss has presented challenges, she has never wavered in her passion for life and her support for her family. Her resilience inspires me to advocate for the many individuals with hearing loss and deliver impactful and accessible treatment. My grandmother is incredibly supportive of my studies in communicative disorders, and I hope to make her proud in my career as an audiologist."
Julia says if she could she "would invent a device that could completely eliminate background noise to improve listening environments for individuals with hearing loss."
Julia's fur baby, Zoey, is an eight-year old goldendoodle that is a puppy at heart!
Would you like to be featured in the student spotlight? We welcome undergraduate and graduate students to complete this Student Spotlight form for the chance to appear in an upcoming newsletter!
Alumni Spotlight
Claire Luttrell
Claire has been a practicing SLP for 5 years after receiving her bachelors degree in Health Sciences from Furman University and her masters degree in Speech-Language Pathology from The University of Alabama. She is the lead speech-language pathologist at the Advanced Institute for Development and Learning (AID-L) in Greenville, South Carolina and has been there since 2019. AID-L is a pediatric clinic for patients with speech, language and feeding disorders from birth to 21 years of age. They also offer parent resources and sensory-friendly events for patients, their families and the community.
Claire specializes in working with children with speech sound disorders and working with children with Down syndrome. She and her co-worker recently started a social group for teens and young adults with Down syndrome and other developmental delays. She is PROMPT trained and has also completed other trainings and continuing education courses in the areas of Childhood Apraxia of Speech, phonological disorders, AAC, and literacy disorders.
"I love being able to help a child clearly communicate, giving them more confidence in themselves. I often work with children who become so frustrated when they are not understood. I love seeing their faces light up when they can communicate clearly to a parent, therapist, or friend!"
Claire also enjoys creating materials for her clients, making something out of nothing. Her favorite project is making file-folder book companions for her thrift store finds. Other materials include word lists, sequencing boards, fill-in-the-blank sentences, inferencing and predicting pages, or even just laminating pictures from the story with velcro backs, which is fun for any kid to pull off and place on another page!
What advice would Claire offer to students and new clinicians?
"Ask all the questions and never stop learning! Ask your placement supervisors 'why?' and even ask yourself 'why?' Learn from as many people as you can. Talk to occupational therapists, physical therapists, doctors, and other speech therapists. Learn from your patients’ parents or family members. Learn from your clients themselves! I still learn on a daily basis in my job and I am not afraid to ask questions!"
Claire and her fiancé plan to marry in September 2024 after their engagement this summer at Lake Martin.
#CraftySLP #ThriftySLP #crazycatSLP #pediatricSLP
Research Faculty Spotlight
Paul Reed, Ph.D., Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies
Dr. Paul Reed is an Associate Professor and Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of Communicative Disorders at The University of Alabama. He received a PhD in Linguistics and trained as a postdoctoral researcher at the University of South Carolina. He directs the Alabama Phonetics Lab, where he and his colleagues study how different people talk across the South. Dr. Reed states, "It is important for us to understand how much variation is present so that our future clinicians can be better prepared to address all clients. The theoretical implications help us understand how humans speak, and the clinical implications involve better understanding of dialectal variation so that we can avoid treating dialectal variation as a disorder."
He has recently received a research grant, in collaboration with Drs. Frances Blanchette (Pennsylvania State Univ), Jessica A. Grieser (Univ of Michigan), and Cynthia Lukyanenko (George Mason). This project, 'What’s in a grammar? A Microcomparative Study of Negation in American Englishes,' funded by the National Science Foundation (NSF), investigates how different groups of speakers produce and respond to negation and double negation, using experimental data to test how grammatical structures overlap or delineate differences between and among groups.
Dr. Reed’s areas of specialization include sociolinguistics, phonetics/phonology, and speech science. His research interests lie in the intersection of society and language, researching how different groups of people sound and attempting to understand why.
Clinical Faculty Spotlight
Christy Albea, Au.D., CCC-A
Dr. Albea is a clinical audiologist with over 20 years of experience in the field. She currently serves as the Audiology Coordinator for the University of Alabama Speech and Hearing Center. In this role, she completes administrative and management tasks related to the audiology services provided at the clinic while also testing and treating clients of all ages with hearing needs. Her particular area of interest is the diagnosis and treatment of Central Auditory Processing Disorder.
In addition to her clinical work, Dr. Albea teaches undergraduate and graduate courses related to audiology, serves as the co-advisor for UA’s chapter of the National Student Speech Language Hearing Association (NSSLHA), and is the UA Speech and Hearing Center’s billing specialist. She also provides clinical education to undergraduate students enrolled in the undergraduate audiology practicum courses (CD 345 – Introductory Audiology Lab Experience; CD 445 – Audiology Lab Experience).
When thinking about memorable moments in her career, Dr. Albea fondly recalls helping a specific client pair his phone to his hearing aids. This client initially did not have a phone with the technology needed to pair with his hearing aids, but he decided to purchase one after meeting with Dr. Albea. At a follow-up appointment later that week, Dr. Albea and a student assisted the client in pairing his hearing aids to his new phone, and they were then able to be in the room with him as he made a FaceTime call to one of his children living in a different state. The client was able to hear his daughter over this call, which made the hearing aids and new phone all worth it.
Dr. Albea has been employed by The University of Alabama Department of Communicative Disorders since 2017. She has greatly increased the presence of the audiology section of the department for both clients and students since joining the department, and we are thankful that she is a part of our team!
Recognitions
In 2003, the UA Speech & Hearing Center was one of the first recipients of the Sam S. May Committment to Service Award. Now 20 years later, we are honored to receive this award again. The Department of Communicative Disorders is thankful for a wonderful team dedicated to providing excellent service in all areas of our clinic.
Sam Dowling has been employed by the Department of Communicative Disorders with supervisor Lacey Watts since October 2013. This fall we celebrated 10 years of service and completion of his mission with the Speech & Hearing Center. Sam has been a wonderful addition to our team. He has learned many new job skills and gained even more friends. We are so proud of Sam and excited for all of the opportunities that await.
Student Organization Highlights
Undergraduate Ambassadors
2023-2024 Undergraduate Ambassadors for the Department of Communicative Disorders, led by Mrs. Candace Cook include Michaela Stambaugh, Rachel Frick, Hannah Collinsworth, Lauryn Stahl, AJ Olliff, Gracie Lee, Lauren Rosen, Madison Cowart, Anna Parker, Kelsie Ruiz, Gracie Parker, Anna Bochnak, Caroline Thigpen, Baylee Jaynes, Julia Bradley
National Student Speech Language Hearing Association (NSSLHA)
Operation Smile Club of Alabama
Operation Smile Officers 2023-2024
President: Kelsey Porter
Vice President: Brae Howell
Treasurer: Ashton Dickey
Secretary: Bailey Weaver
Stay connected with UA Operation Smile on Instagram @uaopsmile and find opportunities for more information and membership there!
Research News
Faculty Presentations
Fall 2023
- Eichorn, N., & Campanelli, L. (2023, November). A preliminary exploration of information processing biases in children who stutter and fluent controls. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) convention, Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
- Campanelli, L., Marton, K., Hale, J. T., & Van Dyke, J. A. (2023, November). How memory retrieval and prediction shape sentence processing. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) convention, Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
- Campanelli, L., Van Dyke, J. A., & Landi, N. (2023, November). Semantic and syntactic processing in poor comprehenders: Evidence from eye-tracking and computational modeling. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) convention, Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
- Kleinman, D., Campanelli, L., Lee, B., Van Dyke, J. A., Brodbeck, C., & Landi, N. (2023, October). Greater reliance on sentence context during naturalistic listening predicts larger reading gains over two years. Society for the Neurobiology of Language (SNL) annual meeting, Marseille, France.
- Dodrill, P., Carnaby, G., Gosa, M.M, Suh, C., & Crary, M. (2023, November). Reliability and validity of the Functional Oral Intake Scale-Pediatric (FOIS-P). Research Poster with Short Presentation at the 13th Annual Congress of the European Society for Swallowing and Swallowing Disorders; Toulous, France.
- Marshall, J., Gosa, M.M., & Dodrill, P. (2023, November). Clinimetric Review of Patient Reported Outcome Measures (PROMs) for the Feeding Skills Domain of Pediatric Feeding Disorder (PFD). Research Poster with Short Presentation at the 13th Annual Congress of the European Society for Swallowing and Swallowing Disorders; Toulous, France.
- Gosa, M.M. & Marshall, J. (2023, November). A Rapid Review of Device Assisted Therapy for Pediatric Dysphagia Management. Research Poster Presentation at the 13th Annual Congress of the European Society for Swallowing and Swallowing Disorders; Toulous, France.
- Marshall, J. & Gosa, M.M. (2023, November). Using Parent Reported Tools in Assessment for PFD. Oral Clinical/Research Presentation at the Annual American Speech-Language and Hearing Association Conference; Boston, MA.
- McGrattan, K., Reynolds, J., Gosa, M.M., & Ochura, J. (2023, November). Preterm Feeding Case Review- Part II Inpatient Feeding Interventions. Oral Clinical Presentation at the Annual American Speech-Language and Hearing Association Conference; Boston, MA.
- Dodrill, P. & Gosa, M.M. (2023, November). Speech Pathology in the NICU: Using Clinical Data to Guide Practice. Technical Clinical Virtual Presentation for the Annual American Speech-Language and Hearing Association (ASHA) Conference; Boston, MA.
- Gosa, M.M., Zang, E., & Rollins, M. (2023, November). Measures of Chewing Function in Children: A Pilot Study. Technical Research Presentation at the Annual American Speech-Language and Hearing Association (ASHA) Conference; Boston, MA.
- Chow, N.,Flahive, L., Nelson, N., Smith, A., Gosa, M.M., Needleman, A. & Hoshaw, G.E. (2023, November). CAA Candidacy: A Pathway to Quality Academic Programs. Administrative Poster Presentation at the Annual American Speech-Language and Hearing Association (ASHA) Conference; Boston, MA.
- Krebs, J., Malaia, E. A., Roehm, D., Wilbur, R.B. (November 6-8, 2023) Neural bases of subject preference in Austrian Sign Language (ÖGS). Crosslinguistic Perspectives on Processing and Learning (X-PPL) 2023, Zurich, Switzerland
- Krebs, J., Malaia, E. A., Roehm, D. (June 26-29, 2023) Visual boundaries in sign motion: processing with and without mouthing cues. Formal and Experimental Advances in Sign language Theory (FEAST 2023), University of Bergen, Norway.
- Krebs, J., Fessl, I., Malaia, E. A., Wiesinger, H.-P., Roehm, D., Schwamender, H., Wilbur, R. (June 26-29, 2023). Event structure reflected in muscle activation differences in Austrian Sign Language (ÖGS) verbs: First evidence from surface electromyography, Formal and Experimental Advances in Sign language Theory (FEAST 2023), University of Bergen, Norway.
- Holliday, N., Reed, P.E. (Jan. 2024). Tone it Down: Inherent bias in automated ‘tone of voice’ evaluation. Five Minute Linguist competition. Linguistic Society of America Annual Meeting. New York, NY. *Winner of the Competition
- Reed, P.E. (Nov. 2023). Multimo: A resource for multiple modal research. Invited plenary address for the 4th University of North Georgia Linguistics Symposium.
- Reed, P.E. (Sept. 2023). Language Variation in Assessment: A View of the Individual. Colloquium talk at the University of Alabama College of Nursing Lunch Colloquium Series.
- Summy, R. (2023, November). Evaluation of screening battery for developmental language disorder. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) convention, Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
- Yoo, H., Su, P. L., Ramsay, G., Long, H. L., Bene, E. R., Klaiman, C., White, S. P., Richardson, S., Pileggi, M. L., Brane, N., Poursoroush, Z., & Oller, D. K. (2023, November). In Part One: Vocal Development in Typically Developing Infants and Infants Later Diagnosed with ASD. Seminar presentation at the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Convention, Boston, MA.
- Yoo, H., Su, P. L., Ramsay, G., Long, H. L., Bene, E. R., Klaiman, C., White, S. P., Richardson, S., Pileggi, M. L., Brane, N., & Oller, D. K. (2023, November). In Part Two: Vocal Development in Typically Developing Infants and Infants Later Diagnosed with ASD. Seminar presentation at the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Convention, Boston, MA.
Student Presentations
Fall 2023
- Ray, J., Marton, K., & Campanelli, L. (2023, November). The bilingual advantage in children across a continuum of proficiency. American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) convention, Boston, Massachusetts, United States.
- Emma Zang and Morgan Rollins were co-authors on Measures of Chewing Function in Children: A Pilot Study, which one the ABSSD award for clinical research in pediatric dysphagia at ASHA 2023.
Clinic Happenings
Audiology Practicum Courses
The University of Alabama Speech and Hearing Center offers hearing services to individuals across the lifespan. These services include the diagnosis and treatment of auditory needs related to hearing loss (including the fitting and dispensing of hearing aids), newborn hearing screening and follow up, cochlear implant mapping, tinnitus management, and auditory processing disorders.
Undergraduate students majoring in Communicative Disorders have two opportunities to apply the material that they learn in their audiology courses in a clinical manner by enrolling in CD 345 – Introductory Audiology Experience or CD 445 – Audiology Lab Experience. In order to expose students to the field of audiology earlier in their coursework, they may enroll in CD 345 as a one credit hour audiology lab experience. This course is perfect for students still deciding between pursuing a graduate degree in speech-language pathology or audiology. Students that are confident that they will be pursuing a doctorate of audiology and applying to audiology graduate programs have the opportunity to enroll in CD 445 for three credit hours. Both courses provide students with direct clinical experience in the evaluation and treatment of auditory disorders as they are able to participate in the provision of services to audiology clients at the UA Speech and Hearing Center and/or off-campus facilities. The department is proud to note that our graduates have been accepted to audiology programs across the country, and these students have expressed that their time at UA prepared them for success at the next academic level.
In addition to these two clinical courses, each semester the audiology faculty and staff host a "Potential AuD Student Night". This is a wonderful opportunity for undergraduates interested in audiology (or not really sure what an audiology program would entail) to talk to alumni about their experiences. It is also a chance to meet other students at UA who are considering a career in audiology.
The audiology program welcomes student observers. If you are an undergraduate student majoring in Communicative Disorders at the University of Alabama and are interested in observing audiology sessions, please email christy.albea@ua.edu to arrange a day and time. We also like to maintain a database of audiology alumni for our undergraduates to contact if they are interested in applying to a particular audiology program. Please email christy.albea@ua.edu if you are an alumnus and would like to be added to the database.
Anyone in the community may schedule an audiology appointment at the UA Speech and Hearing Center. You do not have to be an employee, retiree, or alumni to be seen at the clinic. Please contact the UA Speech and Hearing Center at 205-348-7131 if you would like to schedule an appointment.