NSSLHA at CSULA

Join the NSSHLA team!-WALK NOW FOR AUTISM-April 21st

2012-01-07T10:59:00.000-08:00

Happy New Year from the NSSHLA board for 2012!

We hope this year brings nothing but happiness and opportunities to showcase how wonderful you all are! On that note, we have the first opportunity available for you :)

It's a well known fact that autism has become increasingly prevalent in America. The numbers show that 1 in every 110 children in America is identified with a diagnosis on the autism spectrum ( US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). With a variety of characteristics that include difficulties in social interaction, communication impairments and atypical behaviors that unintentionally exclude children from their peers, we need to do our part to help those exceptional individuals with autism.

So let's show our support for the services that assist children/adults with autism, the families that work hard to give the best quality of life possible, and most importantly, for the children who have autism themselves.

Join the NSSLHA team and take part in the Walk for Autism on Saturday, April 21, 2012. This awesome event will be taking place at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena.
Check out the link below!

https://www.kintera.org/faf/search/searchTeamPart.asp?ievent=993444&lis=1&kntae993444=BF6654943E0840C8950437100F4A5C2D&supId=191089134&team=4906404

By the way, we realize it's a little early. We just want to give you the chance to save the date! Looking forward to seeing everyone there! :)

CSULA COMD at ASHA

2011-11-27T17:35:00.000-08:00

Featuring Dr. Klein and Dr. Flint with students

This year ASHA took place in San Diego, CA. Here are a few pictures capturing fun times at ASHA with CSULA COMD students, faculty and alumni!

Class of 2009 with Dr. Flint

Featuring Dr. Cohick with students

Class of 2012 and 2013 with Mr. Paulson, Dr. Flint, and Dr. Klein

Class of 2010

From NSSLHA Board 2011

2011-11-27T17:21:00.000-08:00

NSSLHA Board 2011 with supervisor Dr. Simon-Cereijido

This is our last official post from your NSSLHA Board 2011. We would like to thank all of you for being a part of our student organization. It was a pleasure being your board. We wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors and studies! Good luck with finals and Happy Holidays!

NSSLHA Meeting- Nov Photos

2011-11-27T17:15:00.001-08:00

NSSLHA members waiting for the meeting to start

Finally! Yes, finally here are pictures from our November Meeting. If you wish to see more, you can find them at our Facebook Page!

Guest Speakers and Alumni Caroline Lee and Amanda Tyree

NSSLHA Board 2011 with guest speakers

Aphasia Movie- Photos

2011-11-27T17:09:00.000-08:00

If you remember in a previous post in the summer, CSULA and CSUN NSSLHA groups held a movie screening of the Aphasia Movie! Here are a few pictures and if you wish to see more, check it out on our Facebook Page!

If you remember in a previous post in the summer, CSULA and CSUN NSSLHA groups held a movie screening of the Aphasia Movie! Below are a few pictures and if you wish to see more, check it out on our Facebook Page!

2012 CSULA NSSLHA Board

2011-11-08T12:24:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to our new CSULA NSSLHA Board for 2012!

President: Kera Allen

Vice President: Sara Parumaa
Treasurer: Tamara Janini
Secretary: Rebecca Perez
Newsletter Editor: Daniel Konishi
Undergraduate Representative: Jessica Chan

On behalf of the CSULA NSSLHA Board (2011), we congratulate you guys and wish you the best of luck. To all of the CSULA NSSLHA members, it was a pleasure serving you this past school year. Good luck with all of your endeavors :)

Fall Newsletter 2011

2011-11-08T11:44:00.000-08:00

Hi NSSLHA members,

This fall newsletter is chock-full of information regarding the ASHA
Convention, which is only a week away! Read on for highlights of the
convention, including presenters from the CSULA academic community,
the COMD Alumni mixer, and NSSLHA day! Other departmental news
includes information about the COMD Science Peer Mentoring program,
and the upcoming graduate school informational meeting.

It has been our pleasure serving you this past year! Congratulations
to the incoming NSSLHA board!

Cheers,
Tiffany & Victoria
NSSLHA Newsletter Co-editors

Nov. Meeting Notes!

2011-11-07T22:07:00.000-08:00

CSULA NSSLHA Meeting Notes
Guest Speakers: Caroline Lee & Amanda Tyree
Date: November 7, 2011

Announcements:

elections
tshirts on sale now at the meeting for $15 (after meeting, $17)
CSULA COMD bags for sale for $1

Guest Speaker- Caroline

works at Pasadena Child Developmental Associates- non profit interdisciplinary clinic
works at a charter school

Guest Speaker- Amanda Tyree

did CFY at a children’s hospital
works at a private practice.

Both Guest Speakers

both participated in the LEND (Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities Training Program) Program

focus is working in an interdisciplinary team
32 weeks long, each Wednesday
has 7 modules (each month a different module)
people from various professionals (RNs, psychologists, social workers, etc) from all over the country
get a holistic view of children that is beyond speech-language

at Pasadena Child Developmental Associates Caroline uses the DIR Floor Time Model:

Developmental: look at a child at all levels (e.g., emotional, cognitive, gross motor skills, etc)
Individual Differences: look at each child individually (e.g., proprioception, sensory issues, etc)
Relationship: investing on your relationship with a child can make a difference in clinic

PROMPT:

method that is for people with apraxia, but this can be used with people with various disorders.
use proprioception, kinesthetic, and tactile prompts

Tips

As students, take advantage of your discounts!
For CASHA, membership is $35/year for students. You can participate in several workshops to give you more knowledge about the speech-language field.
Balance! Maintain your work and recreation life.
Foster your relationships with your peers. Make connections!

Have any of you worked with adults?

Yes. In the grad program you get to do a hospital internship to work with adults.
(Amanda) I have also worked with adults in the private practice I work at. For me, I want to see it all because I work with adults and children right now
(Caroline) I do some home health. I also worked with adults at USC when I was a graduate student.

Where can I get more information about going to workshops?

CASHA has different presentations at their annual CASHA convention.
Several workshops occur throughout the year.
PROMPT is a workshop in itself. You can look this up online.
Both Caroline and Amanda are part of District 7 of CASHA

We have one course on Dysphagia. How much should we look up on our own (regarding the material)?

It’s up to each person individually to do that on his/her own.
Be proactive with your externships. Ask questions. Request for certain clients. Ask to take notes for certain things. Build that relationship with your supervisor there! Take advantage and devour as much information as you can.

With the LEND program, how do you apply?

There’s an intervie.
Program lasts from September to May
Fill out an application.
32-39 programs across the country
It’s a year long program

How difficult is it to get into pediatrics at a hospital?

Positions do not open up as often.
If you are really interested, you should create an externship of this yourself because many hospitals don’t do that.

Do you have to do LEND during your CFY?

No, but it’s easier to do this in your CFY.
You get paid a small stipend to cover your gas.

DIR program, what ages is this for?

Any age.

What resources are there about DIR?

ICDL with Greenspan
Circle Stretch (can find this on the ICDL website)
PCDA also does workshops. Look at www.pasadenachilddevelopment.org
On Wednesday November 9th at 7pm, there will be an autism workshop about iPads at PCDA.

How has the iPad helped in therapy?

It’s good for a tool and productivity.

Children are getting more involved. Can you talk about that?

Some children need services from multiple disciplines.
Not sure if there is an increase with children like this, but you may run into children who need several services.

Did any of you work with cleft palate children?

No. But St. John’s hospital has a cleft palate team and so does Cedar Sinai.

How prepared did you feel about graduation compared to now?

Amanda: I feel a lot different. It might have to do with my temperament. But everything gets better with time.
Caroline: The more kids you come across, you get more of a swagger. Confidence is key. You will always be a student. The key is to seek knowledge.

How big is your caseload?

Caroline: You should know what you’re worth. In my work setting, I negotiated what I wanted. I work with a charter school through an agency. I work three days a week and have 35 students.

Can you tell me about volunteering with PCDA?

they have a volunteer program. Look at www.pasadenachilddevelopment.org
In my session (Caroline), parents are very involved.

Agencies. Can you tell me how or what agencies to work for?

Talk to a person in an agency. If you don’t know the agency, call the agency and ask to talk to someone that works in one.

Make a list of questions to ask during the workshop (for second years). To discuss paper work, negotiating, etc.

Upcoming November 7th Meeting!

2011-11-01T18:51:00.001-07:00

Hello our lovely NSSLHA members!!

Time for our FIRST meeting of the school year! (Sorry about last month's meeting! ) This time it's happening:

What: CSULA COMD graduate student alumni, Amanda Tyree & Caroline Lee will be our guest speakers. Amanda Tyree currently works as a SLP at Children's Hospital of Los Angeles and in a private practice. Caroline Lee works as a SLP for Pasadena Child Development Associates. Topics will include working in a pediatric hospital setting/interdisciplinary setting and the LEND Program (Leadership Education in Neurodevelopmental and Related Disabilities Training Program). An open forum will be available for a Q&A about graduate school, the SLP field in general, externships, and CFY
When: Next Monday November 7th from 6:20-7:10 pm (check in starts at 5:30pm!)
Where: Salazar Hall, Room C260 (Sorry about the far away trek.. BUT...)
Food and drinks will be provided for you! :)

It's very important for you guys to come since elections will take place. Everyone will get a chance to cast their ballot for our new officers!!!! It could be YOU! Also, some other neat things will be happening at our meeting

NSSLHA T-shirts will be on SALE! That's right ladies and gent, $15! That's $2 off the original price ($17).
Dues are due! $20 for the whole school year. This money mostly goes to food and drinks for you guys to eat.
And a Raffle may occur! Gotta come to the meeting then to find out what will be raffled if it happens!

Other things happening in the world of CSULA and Speech Pathology:

The ASHA convention is coming up! Going? Well, the COMD department will be hosting a CSULA COMD Alumni & Current Students event! You can find all the information here on our Facebook Page!

Well that's it folks! Hope to *ahem-I-better* see you at our next meeting =P!

October Meeting is Coming Up & NSSLHA Board Member Opportunities!

2011-10-03T23:49:00.001-07:00

Hello NSSLHA members and Welcome Back!

It's a brand new school year and I'm sure you missed us. To start off our new school year, we have a guest speaker who will talk about being a SLP in a private practice setting. What to know more? Take a peek and check out the deets (details) below!

Who: Justine Sherman, SLP of her own private practice in Sierra Madre

Here is her bio: http://www.justineshermanslp.com/about.php

Private practice website: http://www.justineshermanslp.com/

What: Ms. Sherman will discuss her experience working and running a private practice and share her experiences in the field and an area she specializes in: Certified Orofacial Myologist!

When: TBD

Where: TBD (will email you when we get the room)

If our meeting is not enough, we have MORE for you! You could be our next NSSLHA president, vice president, secretary, treasurer, or newletter editor for 2012! Below is more information from our CSULA NSSLHA president, Sharon Rich:

"In case you haven't heard, there is an AMAZING club in our department- NSSLHA! This stands for the National Student Speech Language Hearing Association. We are among over 300 participating chapters worldwide.

I strongly encourage you to join NSSLHA at CSULA, and at the national level.
*To find out more about NSSLHA and joining at the national level, follow this link: http://www.nsslha.org/join/
*Here is our CSULA NSSLHA website: http://nsslhacsula.blogspot.com/

As an under graduate student or certificate student, one of you gets the amazing opportunity of participating on the board!! Attached to this email is the list of officers' duties along with the application to nominate yourself to run for one of the positions. The deadline for nomination applications is Tuesday, Oct 25th, but if you know you really want to do this awesome job, feel free to submit it earlier!
Note: If you plan on running for CSULA NSSLHA council, you must be a NSSLHA member both at the university AND national level"

Please email us if you have any questions and for the application!

Like us on Facebook

CSULA COMD Alumni and Current Students Event at ASHA!

2011-09-22T22:03:00.000-07:00

Hello all NSSLHA Members and CSULA COMD Alumni!

The ASHA convention is coming up in November and what better time it is to catch up with your fellow CSULA COMD peers! CSULA COMD alumni and current students are exclusively invited and encouraged and welcomed to attend. Plus, food and drinks will be provided!

Please make time to come to catch up with your fellow peers, alumni, and professors!

What: CSULA COMD Alumni and Current Students Meet Up

Where: San Diego Marriot Marquis & Marina Hotel: San Diego Ballroom Salon A

33 West Harbor Drive

San Diego, CA

When: Friday, November 18, 2011 from 8:30pm-10:30pm

FB Invitation can be viewed here!

Aphasia Film Coming to CSULA! Get Your Tickets!

2011-08-04T11:55:00.000-07:00

Did you know that CSULA & CSUN's NSSLHA chapters are hosting an Aphasia Film on Monday August 15?!

Did you know that the Aphasia movie was chosen as the official selection of 2011 Feel Good Film Festival in Hollywood, California?!

Did you know that tickets are running out and that you can STILL purchase yours?!

Well, what are you doing?! Get that ticket!

WHERE: California State University, Los Angeles, at the Student Union Theatre

WHEN: Monday, August 15 at 5:30 pm

WHAT: Aphasia movie screening & Hope is a Four Letter Word Presentation

HOW: Purchase online at http://aphasiamoviescreening.uticketit.com/. Limited seating available!

Synopsis of the movie:
Aphasia is the true story of actor Carl McIntyre who, after suffering a stroke at age 44 and losing his ability to read, write, and talk, struggles against overwhelming odds to redefine his life. Carl McIntyre stars as himself and gives a compelling and nuanced performance in this life-affirming film which puts the audience in the seat of the stroke survivor and provides an emotional and humorous ride as Carl navigates the waters of his new life. Aphasia provides hope and inspiration not only to stroke survivors and their families, but to anyone who has struggled to meet life’s daunting and ever-changing challenges.
The film screening will be followed by a humorous and moving presentation by Carl McIntyre and a brief question & answer session.
Please see the flyer attached for more details!

Hope to see you all there!

Aphasia Screening at CSULA!

2011-07-19T21:15:00.000-07:00

The NSSLHA (National Student Speech Language Hearing Association) Chapters from California State University, Los Angeles and California State University, Northridge are hosting an aphasia awareness event on Monday, August 15th. The event will include a screening of Aphasia the movie, chosen as the official selection of 2011 Feel Good Film Festival in Hollywood, California.

Aphasia is the true story of actor Carl McIntyre who, after suffering a stroke at age 44 and losing his ability to read, write, and talk, struggles against overwhelming odds to redefine his life. Carl McIntyre stars as himself and gives a compelling and nuanced performance in this life-affirming film which puts the audience in the seat of the stroke survivor and provides an emotional and humorous ride as Carl navigates the waters of his new life. Aphasia provides hope and inspiration not only to stroke survivors and their families, but to anyone who has struggled to meet life’s daunting and ever-changing challenges.

The film screening will be followed by a humorous and moving presentation by Carl McIntyre and a brief question & answer session.

WHERE: California State University, Los Angeles, at the Student Union Theatre

WHEN: Monday, August 15 at 5:30 pm

WHAT: Aphasia movie screening & Hope is a Four Letter Word Presentation

HOW: Purchase online at http://aphasiamoviescreening.uticketit.com/. Limited seating available!

Please see the flyer for more details!

Links:
Like us on Facebook

Spring 2011 Newsletter!

2011-06-10T16:52:00.001-07:00

Please checkout our newsletter for Spring 2011!

Congrats to CSULA's COMD graduating students of 2011!

Hemispherectomy Conference Volunteers Needed!

2011-06-10T11:20:00.000-07:00

Hey Everyone!

An amazing volunteer opportunity has come up! The Hemispherectomy Conference is looking for volunteers to watch children who had hemisperectomy surgeries while their parents are at conferences. They need volunteers on 7/9/11. The conference is being held at the Disneyland hotel. There are 2 shifts available, 9 - 1 and 1 - 5. Please email Sharon at Sharonbrich@gmail.com if you are interested!

Meeting Recap from Dr. Biel

2011-05-10T20:51:00.000-07:00

Thank you to everyone who made to our last meeting of the school year with Dr. Biel.

Here are the notes from the meeting:

Michael Biel CScD, CCC-SLP
05/10/11
Intensive Aphasia Treatment: Case of Non-Lexical Recurrent Utterances

This is a case about a gentleman in a program called Pirate (Pittsburgh Intensive Registration Aphasia and Treatment Evaluation) in Pittsburgh.
Why did this program become established? Aphasia is a complex disorder to treat and several veterans at the time had Aphasia.
History: 61 y/o male, with left MCA (Middle Cerebral Artery) CVA (Cerebrovascular Accident) in 2005, global aphasia and severe AOS (Apraxia of Speech)
He had nonlexical speech where he only said, “Ba ma ma ma, huh, ba bum bum ma ma.”
treatment Hx:

had 1-year inpatient rehab
2 years outpatient treatment (tx)
group treatment
various experimental txs
despite tx, his speech did not improve; he was unable to repeat sounds.

In PIRATE:

tx for 6 hours a day for 6 days a week for 4 weeks.

4 hours of treatment were individual tx and the other two hours were in a group setting.

COGNITION:

he scored WNL on the Raven’s colored Progressive Matrices (assesses problem solving) and scored WNL on the pyramids and Palm Trees Test (assesses semantics)

MOTOR SPEECH

no cranial nerve signs
motor speech testing was difficult- did show signs of nonverbal oral apraxia (NVOA)
could imitate a “Uh” and /h/ via a PROMPT
could manipulate rate and prosody of recurrent utterance when given a model

AUDITORY COMPREHENSION

Comprehensive Aphasia Test (CAT)

he scored 21%ile for single word

VERBAL OUTPUT

all tasks resulted in production of the recurrent utterance
chance level performance on a pictured rhyme judgement task from the PALPA; the PALPA is used supplemental to other Aphasia tests.

a picture rhyme subtest is used: a picture of a fan and van are showed and the person has to indicate whether or not the words rhymed or not (yes or no)

On PALPA’s picture-rhyme test he scored in the low percentile level; this means that his apraxia of speech could be and issue of something else.
READING

he had good visual lexical decision making (58/60); this means that for reading, he has some comprehension. He had poor with written rhyme judgment (31/60)
perhaps he had impaired phonological processing?
or impaired subvocalization or verbal working memory

WRITING

he was able to write 6/40 written items on PALPA; this suggests something that we can work with; he was also abel for write by dictation 5/6 3 letter words.

WHY CAN’T SJ (client) REPEAT?

Apraxia of Speech?

He did show non-lexical recurrent utterances; he had some Nonverbal Oral Apraxia; in tx, he demonstrated overgeneralization during articulatory tx.

TX GOALS

1) improve ability to repeat 2) use social greetings 3) improve ability to use writing to communicate

TX PLANNING

Dr. Biel looked up research articles that focused on treatment for individuals with recurrent utterances and studies with individuals with global aphasia and significant AOS. Most of the articles he found were antedotal. One article he found dealt with PROMPT.
Dr. Biel used PROMPT since it was likely that SJ had AOL.

INITIAL GOALS with PROMPT

1) control voicing during production of /h/ and “uh” contrasts
2) control jaw opening in /m/ and “uh” contrasts

PROMPT RESULTS

both goals were not met; he overgeneralized /h/ for “uh”

NOW WHAT?

Do we abandon goal to work on speech?
Try antedotal txs like VCIU or MIPT (multiple input phoneme tx)?
Try melodic intonation therapy?
Dr. Biel tried MIPT after several attempts to contact the author of the research paper about MIPT.

MIPT:

How does this work?
Step 1: gain control of involuntary utterance
Step 2: use sounds in the recurrent utterance to generate new words to practice/probe (if the person says “ma ma” get them to say “ma mom”

CONTROL

Multiple inputs of the target phrase before production attempt.
Integral stimulation (look, listen)
Rhythmic tapping on the ipsilesional arm
Choral repetition with the clinician being louder.

EARLY MIPT RESULTS

SJ controlled production of his recurrent utterances, BUT was unable to produce words generated from the recurrent utterance.

MIPT MODIFICATIONS

Include PROMPT cuing
Try and create unique errors, i.e. errors that contained new sounds or sound combinations; this helped diversify SJ’s phonetic inventory.
After a word was taught, SJ was immediately taught to generalize these words, such as “Hi.”

RESULTS

By the end of tx, he could produce 60 words, mostly one syllable with anterior, visible consonants.
50/60 repeated on post-testing with integral stimulation
On the Syllable Length Repetition subtest (PALPA), he scored he got 6/24 by the end of treatment; initially he scored 0/24. By the end of treatment, he did not use “Ma bum bum.”
By the 4th week of treatment, he was able to produce, “Hi,” “Fine,” and “Bye,” for social greetings.
By the 4th week of treatment, he made improvement with writing but only with specific items which did not generalize.

WHAT CAUSES NON-LEXICAL RECURRENT UTTERANCES?

There is a damaged phonological system that is cut off from other systems in a loop.

NSSLHA T-Shirts & Our Next Meeting!

2011-04-26T14:50:00.000-07:00

T-Shirts are in and ready for pick up! $17 a piece.

Pick up and purchase:

>4-6pm on Wednesday 4/27, outside the Clinician Prep room at the COMD Dept.

Details about our Next Meeting:
When: Tuesday May 10th from 6-7pm
Where: King Hall B4016
What: Michael Biel, a SLP who recently received his clinical doctorate degree from the University of Pittsburgh will be our guest speaker. He has worked for the VA (Veteran Affairs) and recently began working for UCLA. His experience is adult specific. His topic for the meeting will be Intensive Aphasia Treatment: Case Study of an Individual with Non-Lexical Recurrent Utterances.

Autism Walk 2011

2011-04-24T11:33:00.000-07:00

Thank you to everyone who joined us on Saturday for the Walk for Autism! And a special thanks to those who contributed to this charitable cause. We enjoyed walking amongst hundreds of people yesterday and know all of the proceeds will be paid off well :)

Spring 2011 Newsletter- Special Edition

2011-04-18T21:15:00.000-07:00

Hi NSSLHA members!

This is a special edition of our NSSLHA newsletter featuring
Jacqueline Ortiz's experience as a participant in ASHA's Minority
Student Leadership Program (MSLP). The regular quarterly newsletter
will still be published at the end of spring quarter, but we wanted to
put this early edition out because the application deadline for the
MSLP opportunity is fast-approaching and due May 2, 2011. Read the
attached newsletter for more information regarding the program and
Jackie's personal highlights.

April 2011 Meeting Notes!

2011-04-12T23:13:00.000-07:00

Thanks to everyone who made it to our meeting about working with children who are deaf, especially Jane Freutel and Jen De La Paz. If you missed anything, here are the notes from the meeting!

April 11, 2011 Meeting Notes

Announcements:

1. Walk for Autism- Saturday April 23^rd

How to Sign up: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/search/searchTeamPart.asp?ievent=442586&lis=1&kntae442586=6A9703936DEA4476A71068660C84A096&team=4014439&tlteam=0

Meet: us at the check-in section at the Rose Bowl; find our CSULA sign! Walk starts at: 10am

Registration starts at: 8am

Opening Ceremony starts at 9:30am

2. Survivor Symposium at Chapman University- Saturday April 16^th

Includes a panel of patient with ASL, TBI, Strokes and more!

Deadline to sign up is TONIGHT! $10 to sign up (includes refreshments and snacks)

3. T-shirts: will be a black, American Apparel shirt with white writing. See our Facebook page for the design: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=183709131671679#!/pages/Nsslha-at-Csula/188094447878024

Guest Speaker: Jane Freutel, Assistant Director of Teacher Education at John Tracy Clinic

www.jtc.org

History of JTC

· In 1942, Louise Tracy found the John Tracy Clinic (JTC.) She has a child who is deaf. JTC has programs for parents and children who are aged 0 to 6-years-old.

· These programs are free for the children and their families. This includes educational meetings and support groups and counselors that work with families.

What is JTC all about?

· JTC is parent focused. JTC provides parents with hope; parents who go to JTC experience distress and loss about finding out their child has a hearing loss. JTC offers parents guidance in a form of “What do you want to know?” JTC doesn’t preach. If parents do not find a means to meet their needs at JTC, JTC provides resources of where to get help. Lastly, JTC provides empowerment to help parents find resources for their children.

· At JTC, there is an auditory approach where all kids wear hearing aides or cochlear implants.

· The teachers at JTC are expected to know more about teaching speech and the development of speech for children who are profoundly deaf, more than speech and language pathologists.

· If you are interested to see how the teachers in JTC teach children who are deaf, you can look on Youtube and search John Tracy Clinic or go to the website www.jtc.org

· All of the classrooms at JTC have Sound Field FM systems.

The Masters Program for Special Education

· The program is a Masters degree in Special education with an emphasis in deaf deduction at the University of San Diego.

· All of the course work is at Los Angeles. Students start in August and finish the first week of June. There is a total of 44 units.

· 10 month program

· They finish with a master’s degree and after apply for the credential to work with children who are deaf and hard of hearing. The most difficult thing to get finished is the portfolio required (about the state standards for working with people who are deaf.)

· All of the graduate students get jobs for having a background in auditory skill development, auditory focus on speech development, and developmental speech.

· There is a $10,000 fee for tuition.

· There are resources that include scholarships and low-interest loans that provide for survival for a year; it’s not recommended for graduate students to work while in the program.

· Classes start in August. During this time, students observe practicing students work with children who are deaf and hard of hearing.

· There is a Friday Family School with children who are 0-3 years-old. Teachers play with the children; and parents are separated in a different room where they are educated on how to work with their children to encourage speech development.

· Courses also include Audiology courses such as Diagnostics and Amplification. Audiology classes taken at CSULA will be very helpful to do well in these classes.

· Students graduate on May 20^th at the JTC clinic and another graduation at USD.

· The cohort has up to 8 students.

· There is also a distance cohort with students who work across the country with children who are deaf and hard of hearing.

· Students in the master’s program are taught to teach children from 0 to 6-years-old. The credential however is to work with people who are hard of hearing and deaf that are 0 to 22-years-old.

· When students graduate, the options are:

o early intervention (work with children from 0-3 years old)

o work in a special day class

o work with children who are mainstreamed into classrooms

o work with school districts

o work in regional programs

JTC and Speech-Language Pathology

· both share information with oral motor therapy

· both share interest in language development

· at JTC, there is a lot of vocal play

Powerpoint notes from Jane Freutel

· JTC provides hope, guidance, and encouragement to families without a charge, worldwide.

· JTC provides audiological testing, which includes non-sedated ABR (0-60-months-old)

· Screening services are provided at JTC.

· JTC provides Parent-Infant Services

· JTC provide

o parent education classes

o international summer sessions & Latin American summer sessions for parents with children with hearing loss/deaf

o distance learning courses for parents about babies, preschoolers and children with vision and hearing loss.

· New possibilities for people who are deaf: newborn hearing screening, advanced technologies, digital hearing aids, cochlear implants

· Impact of hearing loss: careers, daily living, psychological issues, academic, reading, behavior, emotional, social, speech, language, communication

· Mainstreaming issues: preparation, implementation, support, environment, social

· Information to get involved:

o Tours can be provided

o www.jtc.org/teachered

o prerequisites

§ a 3.0 GPA

§ GRE

§ a bachelor’s degree

§ taken an ASL class

§ experience with children

o call 213-745-8391

o Mary McGinnis, Director

o Jane Freutel, Assistant Director

NSSLHA Meeting- APRIL!

2011-04-08T11:55:00.000-07:00

Greetings NSSLHA Members!

Spring Quarter is finally here and it's time for another NSSLHA meeting!!

What: Jane Freutel will speak about opportunities to work with children who are deaf.

More information about Mary McGinnis can be found at the John Tracy Clinic Website
Where: King Hall B3016
When: Tuesday April 12th at 6pm

Food and drinks will be provided for paid NSSLHA members and a raffle for a Voice textbook will take place!

Other Announcements:
1. You can still sign up for the Autism Walk! We are SO close to meeting our goal!

How can I join the NSSLHA team for the Autism Walk?

join here: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/search/searchTeamPart.asp?ievent=442586&lis=1&kntae442586=5EAD7D71619946848C2C5A7444F0ADA0&team=4014439&tlteam=0
If that link doesn't work, then:

Go to: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=442586
Find "Join or Support a Team" and type in: "CSULA" and press Submit
Click: CSULA National Student Speech Language Hearing Association
4Click Join Our Team and you're in!!

CSHA Convention 2011

2011-03-29T19:13:00.000-07:00

Mr. Paulson received an award for Outstanding Achievement.

Some of our second year graduate students, one of which who had a poster board she presented (Wakana.)

This past weekend was the CSHA Convention at CSULA. Here are a few photos from the convention courtesy of Dr. Simon-Cerejido. See more at our Facebook page!

Announcements!

2011-03-11T17:47:00.000-08:00

1) One of our COMD staff members will be receiving an award at the CSHA convention:

CONGRATULATIONS to Mr. Paulson!

for Outstanding Achievement! If you see him on campus, congratulate him for such an accomplishment!

2) Also, if you would like to learn more about working with children with Autism, you can volunteer for Floortime Family fun day on April 15th from 1-5pm at Griffith park. To sign up, contact:

Meghan Crawford at dr.meghancrawford@gmail.com

3) Applications are available to sign up for MSLP! More information here: http://www.goeshow.com/asha/mslp/2011/

March Meeting Notes

2011-03-08T18:47:00.001-08:00

Here's our meeting notes for March!

Thanks to Diane Collins and Mitch Holden for coming!

March Mtg Notes
03/08/11
Guest: Diane Collins (CSHA President) and Mr. Holden
www.csha.org

Announcements

Autism Walk, April 23rd

join here: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/search/searchTeamPart.asp?ievent=442586&lis=1&kntae442586=6A9703936DEA4476A71068660C84A096&team=4014439&tlteam=0

Guest speakers: Mr. Holden (part of District 6) and Diane Collins
Joining CSHA

help at the upcoming convention March 24-27 at the Los Angeles Biltmore

opportunities to help out
there’s a student luncheon
on the 25th of the convention there's a district reception where students receive scholarships that they applied for

free president reception with food and a classic rock band afterward

on 26th there’s a student luncheon where the students who received scholarships get acknowledged again

be a Student Representative

contact janice@csun.edu for more information

to volunteer at the CSHA convention and let her know you want to help

or contact Diane Collins: slpdicollins@aol.com

can work at the state level or district level
can possibly be in the state board

Mr. Holden works for District 6

Why get involved?

room for professional growth
good networking (e.g. get help making goals, get new connect ions etc)
go to www.csha.org

can see quarterly highlights
see resources of opportunities for students and SLPAs
get legislative updates (from Robert Powell) for professional development at calendar events
one upcoming event is the Survivor Symposium (for students) at Chapman University

you get subscribed to the CSHA magazine
if you go to the CSHA convention you can get a reduced rate for CSHA membership
there’s an Ambassador Program

if you have a friend join, you get 10 points.

each 10 points is a gift certificate
if you get 5 friends to join, that’s one year CSHA membership
10 friends= one free convention registration

Mitchell Holden

responsible for District 6 (includes Los Angeles area)
several legislatures of CSHA are responsible for protecting our profession
CSHA is a great place for networking.

Mr. Holden started to be a member in CSHA in San Francisco
was mentored by many people and had several opportunities
every job he received was due to his networking in CSHA
great camaraderie

use to work in the hospitals and presently works in the schools
CSHA provides great discounts for conventions and CSHA workshops
contact for more information: mholdenslp@msn.com

If interested in going to the CSHA convention

join by Thursday for the discounted rate (preregistration $110 for all 4 days; and after Thursday: $145)
can sign up at www.csha.org

Join CSHA as a student for $35

get professional growth and opportunities
can join online www.csha.org

Student scholarship program

this past year 5 scholarships were rewarded
look for upcoming scholarship programs later this spring

these are due by September 25, 2011

Newsletter Winter 2011

2011-03-08T17:20:00.000-08:00

Greetings!

Check out our newsletter made by our lovely newsletter editors, Victoria and Tiffany!

Newsletter

Good luck on finals and your last quarter papers!

March 2011 Meeting!

2011-03-03T11:59:00.000-08:00

Howdy folks!!

Here are the details about our upcoming meeting next week!

When: Tuesday, March 8th @ 6pm
Where: KH B4016
What: California Speech-Language-Hearing Association (CSHA) president, Diane Collins, SLP will talk about the benefits of joining a professional organization.

Cool links to click on!
1) Here's our FB invite to this meeting: http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=183709131671679
2) LIKE our FB page! http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=183709131671679#!/pages/Nsslha-at-Csula/188094447878024
3) Our nifty blog: http://nsslhacsula.blogspot.com/
4) Our Autism Walk (April 23rd) group you can join: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/search/searchTeamPart.asp?ievent=442586&lis=1&kntae442586=6A9703936DEA4476A71068660C84A096&team=4014439&tlteam=0

Autism Walk April 23rd!

2011-02-16T11:30:00.000-08:00

Hello again!!!

A lot of you have been asking how to join our team for the Autism Walk on April 23rd. Here are the details on how to join:

1. Go to: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=442586
2. Find "Join or Support a Team) and type in: "CSULA" and press Submit
3. Click: CSULA National Student Speech Language Hearing Association
4. Click Join Our Team and you're in!!

Hope to see a lot of you with us at the walk!

February 15th Meeting Notes

2011-02-15T18:06:00.000-08:00

Hello you guys!!

Our meeting was a success! Thanks so much to all of you that made it and especially to our guest speaker Gwendolyn Meier.

As always, here are our notes from the meeting:

February 15, 2011 NSSLHA Meeting

Guest Speaker:
Gwendolyn Meier, MA, CCC-SLP, MT-BC
Speech Therapist & Music Therapist
gmeier@villaesperanzaservices.org

Announcements

CASHA: conference for March 24th

you can volunteer and go there for free (must be a CASHA member)
CASHA president is coming to our March meeting

Autism Walk on April 23rd (Saturday) starts at 10am at the Rose Bowl

join our team at: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=442586

search for our team “CSULA”

team goal of $2000

LIKE our Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Nsslha-at-csula/188094447878024

Gwendolyn:

Works for Villa Esperanza Services School

the clinic is open for the public
opened primarily to students who attend this school
several services are provided here including speech language therapy
can LIKE Villa Esperanza on Facebook

COMMUNICATION IN AUTISM

Villa Esperanza primarily serves children with moderately to severely disabled children; several have Autism and are non-verbal.

Autism

is a neurological disorder that affects 1 in 150 or less births; 4:1 boys: girls
no single cause- multiple, unknown factors combined

-perhaps there are genetic and environmental factors

defined by behavior- no medical test for autism
no cure
severity falls on a spectrum

-there’s high functioning (like Aspergers)

various treatments options
the earlier you can get good intervention, the better
Difficulties in:

Social interaction (difficulty with eye contact, sharing enjoyment, reciprocity
Communication (language delay, lack of make-believe play challenge in back-and-forth conversation
Behavior (repetitive, insistence on sameness)
it’s not Schizophrenia

Symptoms and Characteristics

Social interaction

differences in: sharing/showing (don’t share and show,) connecting with others (do not connect with others), relationships/emotional reciprocity
differences in social-imitative play
back-and-forth play: children with autism tend to play around other kids and not with others
differences in using language like others do

to share interests
to give and seek information (tend to not ask, “What’s that?”)

Communication

differences in understanding expectations

waiting your turn, keeping hands to yourself, etc.
reasoning of why things are done is usually lost

differences in understanding and using nonverbal communication (point, shrug, hand signal, facial expressions, tone of voice)
differences in learning and using language like others do

i.e., children with autism tend to get into their own dialogues over the past
for example like the movie in Temple Grandin

Temple had autism who got her Phd in Agriculture and Cattling
She learned through pictures

differences in make-believe (using one object for another,) social-imitative play , and conversation
abstract concepts

dates, time
why? how?

can’t answer why and how questions

emotions
What will happen if? What can you do to help?

hypotheticals and inferences are difficult

Social interaction

differences in seeing others’ point of view, making and keeping friends (i.e., sharing, doing what others want to do)

Behavior

differences in preoccupation with parts of objects

i.e., instead of driving a toy car, the child may just spin the wheels only

differences in motor mannerisms (flapping hands, stimming, etc.) and sensory sensitivities (do not like getting dirty, sensitive to light and sound)
differences in

intensity of focus

i.e., focus on bubbles themselves except for asking for bubbles to be blown

inflexible routines
self-control/impulsivity

Helping people with Autism

More than Words Hanen program

designed for children with autism
TIPS: say less, and stress and go slow and show

Say less:

keep it simple but grammatical (i.e., “Turn page,” to “Turn the page.” This provides an intact model.)
be direct and tell what TO do (don’t use negative words and direct them to what they should do)

Stress:

highlight the most important words (sometimes say the target word at the end)
repetition
carrier phrases, “The __ is ___.”

Go slow:

add pauses (allow for auditory processing time)
be natural (use natural prosodic speech pattern)

and Show

provide a model
provide pictures (like a choice board)
provide a video

can use an iPod application Model Me Kid (free)
most children with autism are visual learners

Choice boards

these are pictures options

which do you want? (break, book, toys, etc)

Cue Cards- receptive and expressive

Remind them what to DO and/or to SAY in a given setting or activity

Social Stories online

http://www.thewatsoninstitute.org/teacher-resources2.jsp?pageid=2161392240601226415747290
example categories include: anger, at home, friends, upsetting behaviors, school routines, self control, sensory needs

Increasing expression

can use Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC)

may supplement existing speech or replace speech that is not functional (ASHA)

Visually-based communication

picture exchange communication (PECs)

exchange pictures for communication
a low tech AAC system (without batteries)

voice output devices
GoTalk 4+
Tech Talk 32
touch screens

Prentke-Romich (PRC) Vantage Life
Dynavox V
Apple iPod touch and iPad

ProLoQuo2Go
TouchChat HD by Silver Kite

Resources Online:

http://www.specialed.us/index.html

Villa Esperanza Services

event on Saturday February 26, 2011
will be at Autism Walk on April 23rd at the Rose Bowl

can get free bags
look for jobs
games and prizes for kids

Autism Certificate

requires 4 classes
see Special Education Department at CSULA on the first floor of King Hall

Autism Info Handout

February 15th Meeting

2011-02-02T20:03:00.000-08:00

Happy February!

I have a few announcements to give you lovely COMD people!

1) Our second meeting of 2011 is coming up!

When: February 15, 6pm
Where: KH B4016
Who: Gwendolyn Meier
What: Gwendolyn Meier will discuss about working with children with severe communication disorders, specifically autism.

Again, food and drinks are provided, only to members who have paid their dues, and a raffle for a gift card for Starbucks OR a text book: 50 cents a ticket!

2) The Autism Walk is coming up (April 23rd) and we'd love to have all of you join us! Our goal is ultimately $2000, and any thing you or your friends/family can contribute truly helps.

How to join our team for Autism Walk
1. Go to: http://www.walknowforautismspeaks.org/faf/home/default.asp?ievent=442586
2. Find "Join or Support a Team) and type in: "CSULA" and press Submit
3. Click: CSULA National Student Speech Language Hearing Association
4. Click Join Our Team and you're in!!

3) Join our new Facebook PAGE: http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/pages/Nsslha-at-Csula/188094447878024
**See posted pictures of NSSLHA last year at the Autism walk!!!

Jan 18th Mtg Notes

2011-01-18T19:01:00.000-08:00

Hello!

Thank you to all of you who were able to attend our first NSSLHA meeting of 2011. We had a bigger turn out than expected and we appreciate all of you for bearing with our small room.

If you didn't get to make it to the meeting or missed a few things, here are some notes for the meeting!

January 18, 2011 NSSLHA Meeting Notes

Guest Speaker Susan Simon

Working with LAUSD

LAUSD covers 700 square miles (2nd largest after NY)

excludes Beverly. Hills, Culver City, and Santa Monica
currently 418 SLPs-biggest employer in the states
800 schools (3yrs-22yrs)

allow the therapists to grow
can work in various areas (special ed center, young children, older children)
can do assignment survey and request where you want to work since LAUSD is so large
case load variety
second largest school district
different from working from hospitals and private practice because LAUSD helps children access their education program
new therapist support: when you go out on your interviews ask about “New Therapist Support”

New Therapist Support:

have 2 weeks of intensive training and trainers tell you what to do when sent out to designated schools
teach you how to treat
meet trainers once a month
allows you to network and build a cohort

If you’re a person that wants to work in the schools, you should find a district where you can grow with the administration

there are several SLPs that work in administration (i.e., principals, etc.)

Benefits

CFY/RPE supervision
District Sponsored Continuing Education
Prevention and Intervention Services
Leadership Opportunities
Web based IEPs documentation (get laptop from LAUSD)

Salary Options for SLPs

With Masters Degree and CA license

Starting at $61,433 (180 days of work)
within 5 years: $70,756
done at 4pm
have summer and winter break and holidays off

With Credential

Starting at $45,637 to $52,552

Employment Requirements (not an exhaustive list)

online application
master’s degree in SLP or COMD
Health & TB clearance
fingerprint clearance
transcripts 2 sets
employment eligibility components
letter of recommendation
CBEST

Benefits of employment with LAUSD

paid holidays
competitive salaries
illness leave with 10 days a year with roll over (you can take sick days with you from district to district)
district pays for your full medical, dental, vision and some life insurance
if you have a domestic spouse and 12 children, the district will pay that for you without touching your pay check.
state teacher retirement- put five years in the system, after that you are guaranteed a monthly income for retirement
loan forgiveness: if you work for a title 1 school, you get $17,500 waived if you have federal loans.
mortgage assistance/credit union

Additional incentives for LAUSD speech therapists

new therapist orientation and support
professional growth, advancement and special assignments
collaboration with School professionals
provides materials without a budget

LAUSD Administrative Offices Recruitment and Selection

18th floor 333 South Beaudry ave, Los Angeles, CA 90017

Susan Simon (213) 241-6200

email: susan.simon@lausd.net

William Hatrick (213) 241-5300, ext 29293

email: william.hatrick@lausd.net

if you graduate august 2012, you are eligible for interview with the district, LAUSD will write you a check for $5000 (scholarship stipend-tax free)

must commit 2 years (one for fellowship)
do student teaching with LAUSD
Application website

Guest CSULA Graduate Speaker working for LAUSD

worked for LAUSD because of incentives (support from many people, stable job)
worked with preschoolers to a young man in prison
good professional development

Q&A

How much control do we have with where we will be placed?

When you get signed on with LAUSD, you don’t know what your assignment is. Assignments are made in spring for fall. You sign up for the entire district. LAUSD will put you within 25 miles from your home. They take into consideration what you want. Coming mid year your assignment may change.

What are the chances of a SLP getting laid off?

Slim. Most likely other people will get cut before a SLP does.

Anything may happen to health benefits in the future?

LAUSD still offers lifetime health benefits. This may change.
When you hire into a district, you are on a 1-2 year probation. At your 3rd year you have an evaluation and it’s determined if you have permanent status. If you have permanent status and want to work part time, your benefits are still covered; this may change however.

What’s the desire for bilingual for monolingual therapists?

70% of district is designated for ELL. Of that 70%, 90% are Spanish speaking.
If a child is bilingual, assessment must be done in English and Spanish
If language of instruction is English, treatment is in English.
Being monolingual doesn’t hinder you from getting hired.

If you work in Special Ed, do you get special training?

Jan 18th Mtg in Room King Hall B3009

2011-01-18T11:27:00.000-08:00

Happy Tuesday!!

Sorry for the inconvenience but we just confirmed the meeting for tonight!

When: Tuesday January 18th from 6-7pm
Where: King Hall B3009
Topic: Susan Simon, a Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) SLP will be discussing the benefits for working as an SLP for LAUSD.

Please bring membership dues if you have not paid yet ($20 for the whole year or $15 for the remainder of the year.)

Also, we will be having a raffle for a textbook!

Drinks and food will be provided!

Also check out and join our new Facebook Group page: http://www.facebook.com/home.php?sk=group_184811684882162

January 18th NSSHLA Meeting

2011-01-07T16:31:00.000-08:00

Hello and Welcome Back to school!

It's that time of the year again for our next NSSHLA meeting!

When: Tuesday January 18th from 6-7pm
Where: TBD (will be updated when the room is confirmed & keep a look out for fliers/posters around the COMD dept)
Topic: Susan Simon, a Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) SLP will be discussing the benefits for working as an SLP for LAUSD.

Fall 2010 Newsletter

2010-12-06T18:03:00.000-08:00

Hello everyone!

Finals week has arrived and it's time to buckle down and get focused. All of you may be busy studying, but for a short study break you can read our Fall 2010 Newsletter. It includes information about the Speech-Language Pathology Assistant (SLPA) program. So take a look!

Good luck with finals!

NSSHLA Council 2011-2012

2010-12-01T21:26:00.000-08:00

Congratulations to our new NSSHLA Council for 2011-2012!

President- Sharon Rich
Vice President- Alissa Godwin
Treasurer- Louisa Lim
Secretary- Marthie Delacruz
Newsletter Editor- Tiffany Chin & Victoria Martinez
Undergrad Rep - Michael Repajic

NSSLHA Meeting Tuesday, November 9th

2010-11-03T00:45:00.000-07:00

Make sure you make it to our meeting!

When: Tuesday, November 9th 6:00-7:00pm
Where: King Hall, B111
Topic: Parkinson’s Disease

Todd Bischoff, MS, CCLS is an International Speaker who shares advice and wisdom from his life experiences to motivate others to overcome their personal challenges. Currently battling Young-Onset Parkinson’s Disease, Todd continues to share his message of hope and determination wherever he can. Check him out at http://www.toddbischoff.com/
☺ Food and drinks provided ☺

We will also have elections for 2011 NSSLHA Council, and we're voting on a t-shirt design!
-Members only get to vote-
Don't forget your member dues- $20 for the entire year!

See you there!

NSSLHA meeting Tuesday, October 5th

2010-08-19T23:00:00.000-07:00

Mark your calendars! The next NSSLHA meeting will take place on Tuesday, October 5th from 6-7pm in KHB111. Rest assured, you should have no classes during this time!

Topic: Traumatic Brain Injury

Peggy Harris, MPH, renovated a home to meet the needs of adult post brain trauma victims (Banner Home). She will provide information about Traumatic Brain Injury and our role as Speech Therapists with this population.

For more information, check out her website at http://www.braininjuryhomes.com/
Have your questions ready!

Also, if you'd like to become a member, be sure to bring your dues for the new year!
Annual member dues: $20 or $5 per quarter.

Why become a member? We provide yummy dinner for you during each meeting, and you get to vote in the upcoming election in November!

Got any ideas for speakers? Email one of the officers on the right hand side. We'd love your input!

See on October 5th!

Minutes May NSSLHA Meeting

2010-05-14T19:53:00.000-07:00

Behavioral Learning Center, Inc.
Unlocking Autism One Piece at a Time

Speaker: Jody Steigemeyer, M.S., SLP CCC, BCBA
Clinical Director

Behavioral Learning Center, Inc. (BLC)
(From the Brochure)

Mission Statement:

Behavioral Learning Center, Inc. (BLC) is an agency serving children within Southern California. BLC is currently authorized to provide intensive behvaioral services (Discrete Trial Training/Applied Behavior Analysis) and Functional living skills(Adaptive Skills Intervention Program) to consumers who possess the diagnosis of Autism or other developmental disabilities (according to DSM-IV-TR) and who range in age from 2-14 years of age.

Philosophy:
BLC believes that every child deserves the opportunity to learn and excel. The philosophy of on-going collaboration between parent/caregiver and provider is of "utmost" importance and is necessary for the effectiveness of the intervention.

BLC Strives to provide the highest quality of service in a caring environment. Each program is custom tailored to meet each child's unique needs and individual characteristics.

Behavioral Learning Center, Inc.
Discrete Trial Training * Adaptive Skills Training
28514 Constellation Road
Valencia, CA 91355
(661) 254-7086
info@behaviorallearningcenter.com

www.BehavioralLearningCenter.com

Minutes April NSSLHA Meeting

2010-05-14T19:43:00.000-07:00

Mi Sueno Speech Therapy

Working as an SLP in a private practice setting.

The benefits of working in a private practice
-Both medical and educational case load
-Flexible schedule
-Highly independent

Mi Sueno Speech Therapy clients
-Early intervention
-Pediatrics
-School Districts
-Insurance

Mi Sueno Therapy Setting
-Diverse
-Highly trained: Floor time, PECS, PROMPT
-Individualized Meetings
-Varied Caseloud

Mi Sueno Speech Therapy
114 N. Second Ave.
Covina, California 91723
www.misuenospeech.com
(626) 732 - 1111

April 5th Meeting - Private Clinic Setting

2010-03-30T17:05:00.000-07:00

April 5th NSSLHA Meeting

Topic: Private Clinic

When: April 5th, 2010 at 6:15 PM

Where: KH D1047

Please join us Monday April 5th for our NSSLHA meeting about working as an SLP in a private clinic.

Norma Lopez MS, CCC-SLP will be speaking about her experience as the President of a private clinic specializing in Bilingual English/Spanish services.

We hope to see you there!

NSSLHA MARCH MEETING - WORKING IN THE VA MEDICAL SETTING

2010-03-29T22:08:00.001-07:00

Anne Preddy graduated with her MA in Communication Disorders from CSULA in 2008. She now works as an SLP at the Long Beach VA Medical Center and came back to tell us about what she does every day at the VA.

SLPs at the VA do a little bit of everything and treat a variety of communicative disorders including speech, language, voice, dysphagia, cognitive disorders, and swallowing.

Anne’s job which was at first overwhelming has turned out to be a rewarding opportunity to pursue a career she’s extremely passionate about. She referred to SLPs at the VA as “jacks of all trades ” because in this setting every day presents new challenges and opportunities to use the latest technology in assessment and intervention.

Patients at the VA are veterans ages 19 to 99 that have served our country over the decades. Working in this setting has enabled Anne to provide services to this population and assist them in their return to their lives at home.
Since Anne started working at the VA about 2 years ago she has gained experience with a number of assessment and intervention strategies in a range of areas. Anne mentioned a number of different assessment tools that she has had the opportunity to utilize and gain valuable experience with on a daily basis. Working at the VA in her opinion is “heaven for a gadget geek” because there are so many opportunities to work with cutting edge technology. The VA setting provides valuable experience with the most current assessment and intervention devices and technology like fiber optic endoscopes, electrolarynx devices, TEP, AAC, oral motor exercises, Barium swallow tests, standardized tests, cognitive prosthetic devices and cognitive group therapy.

She has worked with a number of patients who have sustained injuries like TBIs from blasts, IEDs, and grenades. SLPs working at the VA use a multidisciplinary approach to treatment and provide a host of functional cognitive group therapy programs like College Connection and Brain Boot Camp that teach patients compensatory strategies and provide opportunities to learn to problem solve in a number of activities of daily living.

Working at the VA hospital provides SLPs with the opportunity to provide these brave veterans with the treatment and compensatory strategies they need to resume a life that in some ways resembles the one they had before going to war.
Anne’s Pros and Cons of working at the VA

Pros:
The positive impact you have on the lives of veterans
The opportunity to work with adults
Collaboration with other SLPs and medical professionals
The potential to participate in research projects
Access to cutting edge technology

Cons:
Longer work hours
Less vacation time
The “Yuck Factor”

February 1 Minutes

2010-02-13T16:45:00.000-08:00

Minutes of February 1, 2010 Meeting

Guest Speaker

Amber Hogan M.A., CCC-SLP with the Los Angeles Union School District (LAUSD)

Amber is an SLP working in LAUSD, the second largest public school district in the U.S. She is a consultant for Alternative and Augmentative Communication Devices and currently works with 71 clients ranging from ages 3-22.
Amber has over 70 students in her caseload and conducts consultations for AAC devices throughout the week. She works with a range of students in individual AAC consultations, individual and group sessions and classroom integration. Each day presents a new challenge that promises to be new, different and interesting. Visit her Blog and read about what life is really like as a school based SLP in LAUSD.

For more information on Alternative and Augmentative Devices (AAC) and other helpful resources please visit Amber’s Blog Corner at abc4slp.info.

2010-01-11T19:18:00.000-08:00

Minutes of January 11, 2010 Meeting
Guest Speaker: Susan Simon, M.A., CCC-SLP with the Los Angeles Union School District (LAUSD)
Ms. Simon worked as an SLP for LAUSD for many years, and is now an administrator. She currently supervises 70 SLPs. LAUSD employs 400 SLPs, and is probably the largest employer of SLPs in the state. LAUSD covers 700 miles and includes 8 local school districts.
• LAUSD is the 2nd largest school district in U.S., with 640K students, 82,000 in Special Ed, and 28,000 receive speech-language services
• Urban & suburban experience, and everything in-between; caseload variety, curriculum based intervention
• LAUSD offers employees the opportunity to change to different position – not just SLP – e.g., opportunities to become administrator, or vice-principal, in smaller districts, this would not be possible not the
• For SLPs, the following is offered by LAUSD:
o CFY/RPW supervision, District Sponsored continuing education, Prevention & Intervention Services: focus on RTI, have to prove to a team that you have helped the child (help teachers), Leadership opportunities, Web based IEPs & daily documentation, District provide lap-top, Students with variety of disabilities ages 3-22
• Salary Options for SLP: with MA and CA License $61,433/$70,756 (Special Services pay scale – applies to SLP grads who have never worked as a teacher; however, $70,000 is probably not available for a CFY year), with a credential SLP salaries are $45,637 - $72,592 (based on teacher pay scale, not applicable to new SLP graduates)
o Work 180 work days with 10 weeks off at summer, 3 weeks off in winter, and 1 week off in spring
o By 5th year, SLPs can expect to earn up to $76,000 annually at LAUSD
• LAUSD SLP Employment requirements:
o Online applications
o MA in SLP or ComD
o Eligibility for CA SLP or SLP credential
o CBEST (take it now, your score will last forever)
o Successful interview
• Other requirements: Health & TB clearance, Fingerprint, Transcripts, Employment eligibility documents, Letters of Recommendation
• Other Benefits: 20 paid holiday, 10 illness/sick days yearly (accumulate if not used) can take them to other district in CA, District-paid medical, dental, vision, which includes spouse or domestic partner & dependents; District paid life insurance; STRS membership; Loan forgiveness; LA teachers mortgage assistance; Credit union
• Myth about LAUSD: get lost in such a big district – given your assignment
o Truth: are part of central office, assignments are made from there, and when first start, have intensive training for 2 weeks, when go to school site where you are helped w/scheduling your students
o And once per month, meet with all new trainer, and this goes on for 12 months – have meetings with your trainers, e.g., how to use an interpreter
o Every year, are given an assignment survey – and can ask to go elsewhere
For more information: Susan Simon 213-241-6200; email susan.simon@lausd.net; see also website: teachinla.com/speech
Currently offering $5,000 stipend for 2nd year grad students – if you know you want to work as a public school SLP, interview with LAUSD and, if offered a position (which would begin after graduation), agree to a 2 year work commitment, and you get a check for $5,000.

NSSHLA meeting January 11, 2010

2010-01-04T19:46:00.000-08:00

Guest Speaker: Susan Simon of LAUSD will discuss the benefits of working at LAUSD
Time: 3:15 p.m.
Place: KHB 111

NSSLHA Meeting November 3rd, 2009

2009-11-03T20:32:00.000-08:00

NSSLHA MEETING 11/3/2009: AAC
Speaker: Adam Weiss from Zygo Industries
- his company produces voice output systems, alternative access, environmental control system
- AAC = augmentative alternative communication
- Why do you need voice output?
- Must prove that it is medically necessary to provide a voice output device
- SLP is the one who has to recommend a product for their client, need to document the need for it and choose which device or devices are necessary
- Provided handout about various devices and contact information
- Communication device can provide voice output through digital or synthezed speech.
- Macaw: digital recording device, vocabulary is recorded speech and use overlay to represent vocabulary that is stored on the machines. Symbols can be pictures, letters, graphics, words. Press on a cell and get recorded message that speaks out. Most of the overlays are pictures with text prompts. Can start off with overlay being just message, then increase the number of symbols until client can use many symbols on one overlay. All of the overlays don’t have to be the same layout (i.e. the same number of symbols). Macaw can sequence/combine two symbols to create additional messages. Can sequence up to 80 characters in a row.
- Windows XP tablet computer: dynamic display device. Make choices by touching the screen. Has a 22 GB hard-drive. Can fit more voice recordings and pictures on this device than the Macaw. Don’t have to physically change the overlay. It is cognitively more difficult than the Macaw and may not be appropriate for people who have cognitive impairments. Can plug in a tracking mouse or eye-gaze system if client can’t physically touch icons on the screen.
- PECS: can take pecs symbol and place it on the macaw overlay symbol that it matches and it makes the Macaw do voice output.
- can record various languages on the Macaw. Can use a single overlay but record two different languages for each symbol.
- Pollyanna (text to speech): person is cognitively intact but cannot be understood. Uses deck talk to transfer typed text into voice output. Had word prediction for word you are typing and for the proceeding word. ‘
- Medicare will pay for a dedicated communication device- means that all it is used for is the communication that the SLP recommends.

NSSLHA Meeting October 6th, 2009

2009-10-07T00:18:00.000-07:00

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Announcements:

- tote bags for sale $10 --> contact Bailey Duemmel to purchase.

- pay for dues for the quarter ($5) or the entire year ($20) ---> Pay dues to May Wu.

- First year graduate students apply for NSSLHA positions. Email Claire at CWbrownie84@yahoo.com

Speaker: Laurie Campbell

- speech language pathologist in hospital setting

- born in Panama, had an active childhood

- currently has Parkinson’s Disease

- her early symptoms were similar to the flu, felt achy

- had bad headaches, neck strain

- she started fainting

- first diagnosed with migraines, put on migraine medication and had a stroke from it

- she had a lot of difficulty getting doctors to take her seriously and properly diagnose her.

- Parkinson’s is a brain disorder that affects the substantia negra

- Caused by a lack of dopamine in the body

- Dopamine doesn’t cross the blood/brain barrier and the body can’t absorb dopamine

- Signs and symptoms: rigidity, slowness of movements, visible shaking/tremors, difficulty with balance, cramping, stiff facial expressions, muffled or slurred speech, depression, dystonia is a symptom for young onset of PD.

- Seeing more of young-onset cases because there is more awareness and research being done.

- PD usually affects people over 65 y/o, 10% of people with PD start having symptoms before 40 y/o.

- There is no test to diagnose PD, it’s a process of elimination

- Those with parkinsonism or the symptoms and signs of PD without the disease itself can be due to medications, drugs, or other disorders or injuries.

- 3 types of PD: young-onset, idiopathic parkinson’s, and secondary parkinson’s

- people with PD become depressed because serotonin levels are also lacking

- because the disorder is progressive, constantly need to change medication as the symptoms change and progress

- as an SLP, should ask at every session if patient with PD has had any falls, if they are taking their medication, what they are taking

- There are no cure for PD, can treat with medications and surgery.

- Exercise slows progression of the disease ---> shown by recent studies, a new phenomenon.

- Treatments don’t slow the progression of the disease, but improve motor function and quality of life.

- However, the benefits gained by these treatments decline as the disease progresses.

- Levadopa helps produce dopamine in the brain and it reduces slowness, tremors, and stiffness.

- Sinemet is an older medication

- Selegiline inhibits the enzyme MAO-B, which breaks down dopamine. Carries some anti-depressant effect.

- There are two types of surgery: Pallidotomy and deep brain procedures. Patients who receive the most benefit from surgery are people with good general health, normal intellectual/memory function for their age, and continue to have benefit from levadopa.

- Pallidotomy destroys a section of the brain and helps with tremors, rigidity, bradykinesia, and levadtop-induced dyskinesia.

- Lee Silverman voice treatment is used for people with PD ---> patient does treatment (talking really loudly) five days a week for an hour plus an hour of homework, 2 hours of homework on the weekends.

- Need to always be aware of what the goals are of the patient

NSSLHA Meeting Minutes May 4th, 2009

2009-05-27T21:35:00.002-07:00

NSSLHA Meeting 5/4/2009
Speaker: Debbie Schram
- Announcement: Work for Hallmark Rehabiliation for one year after you graduate, and they will pay for your tuition or student loan. You can visit their website for more information at http://www.hallmarkrehabinc.com/

- She has been in recovery since July of 2007
- She progressed into state where she couldn’t communicate with anyone. She didn’t know what was going on.
- She struggled to find the words to use to say “I had a stroke.”
- Has left hemisphere brain tumor
- Gave her 4 months to live.
- She was given signs on paper so she could point to yes, no, right left.
- She had speech therapist that came to her house. She had worksheets for filling out phrases, prepositional phrases, sequencing steps.
- The speech therapy was helpful.
- Her and the speech therapist would have conversations.
- At 18th month, there was a period of spontaneous recovery- she was able to communicate much better.
- She would use content words and leave out all of the function words. At 18 months, she could use more function words so people could understand what she meant.
- Her comprehension is good.
- She participated in a cancer retreat. She was overwhelmed. She was aware of everything that was going on, but she couldn’t understand what was wrong with her and why she couldn’t communicate.
- She could write, but she couldn’t speak.
- She thinks others perceived her to be retarded, incompetent.
- Using gestures, the computer, facial expressions, yes or no questions work well for her.
- She has trouble finding specific words.
- Pictures work well, flashcards that have a picture on one side and word on the other are also helpful.
- DMV, police don’t understand what aphasia is. Using a card that explains her situation helps.
- One thing SLPs can do to help people with aphasia is help the families understand what the impairments are and what they aren’t, what the patient’s strengths and weaknesses are.
- Debbie is in a rehabiliation program at Coastline College for people with brain injuries. Debbie is in the language class. All of her classmates have good comprehension, but poor speaking abilities.
- Her sister, Marilyn, uses various strategies to communicate with Debbie – she can point to an option of 2 things, waiting for a response, not talking too much, not guessing/anticipating what Debbie is going to say, and to not push Debbie to talk.
- Writing is easier for her than speaking. Sometimes the same mistake comes out in the writing as it does in speaking.
- She is good at reading out loud. It is a little hard to pronounce some words.

NSSLHA Meeting Minutes April 13th, 2009

2009-05-27T21:35:00.001-07:00

NSSLHA Meeting 4/13/2009
Announcement:
WALK FOR AUTISM April 25th
Register at walknowforautism.org, click on register, create a team or join our team WHEELS ON THE BUS
For more information, email baileyslea@yahoo.com

Topic: AUTISM Speaker: Gwendolyn Meier
- Autism is a spectrum disorder (classic autism -→ high functioning autism -→ Asperger Syndrome)
- A behaviorally defined condition
- Neurological disorder
- Severe impairments in: socialization, communication, behavior and interests
- Need 6 symptoms from 3 categories in the Diagnostic Criteria (DSM-IV): Social interaction (2 symptoms), Communication (1), Restricted, Repetitive, & Stereotyped Behavior & Interests (1)
- Diagnosis usually happens at Regional Centers
- Kids with autism don’t play with toys in the way typical children do: they focus on a specific part of a toy, employ self-stimulatory behaviors
- Idiosyncratic use of language
- Need very structured, concrete activities
- If something unexpected happens in their schedule, they may have a tantrum
- Many will self-stimulate: touch, visual
- Core deficits in Autism: what areas you think are core deficits will determine what you treat in therapy
1.) Joint Attention – poor response to name, lack of showing and sharing; if child doesn’t follow where his/her parent is pointing to, child won’t learn what the referent is.
2.) Symbolic Skills- coming up with the concept for the language referent; symbolic skills are apparent in language and play
- Estimates of incidence of Autism has changed a lot in recent years → could be due to population growth, data collection, investigators, change of diagnostic criteria, migration to CA, change in categorization
- Estimates of incidence of Autism are: 1 in 150 (Autism Speaks, 2009)
4-5/10,000 (prior to 1985)
- Etiology and Suspect Factors: genetic link, comorbid medical issues (GI concerns, sleep problems, allergies/infections), NOT caused by parenting, multifactorial cause
- Possible Triggers: Exposure (in utero, after birth, toxins), immunologic, metabolic, MMR vaccine debate (jury is still out)
- Evolution of Treatment: 40’s and 50’s: removal from home, 60’s and 70’s: behavioral teaching/operant conditioning, controlled settings (food deprivation, aversives, poor generalization), 80’s 90’s and 00’s: “naturalistic” behavioral approaches, natural reinforcers, daily settings, motivation, self-initiation, connection between communication and problem behavior, amount and type of stimulation (debate)
- No definitive evidence for any one treatment approach over another
- SLP Assessment: standardized measures look at language FORM and elicited responses, primary deficits lie in pragmatic USE of language/FUNCTIONS, initiation, and rate of communication, few resources aid us in evaluating pre-intentional, pre-verbal, and nonverbal communication
- Visual schedules: organizes the child’s day, establish routines, predictability, expectations
- Aided language stimulation/visually cued instruction: make language input visual and intransient, provides language model
- PECS: provides means to make requests
- For more information, visit autismspeaks.org

NSSLHA Meeting Minutes March 3rd, 2009

2009-03-03T00:27:00.001-08:00

NSSLHA Meeting 3/2/09
Anne Preddy
- Works at the VA Hospital in Long Beach → doing CFY
- Sees in-patients and out-patients
- Cognitive evaluation and treatment – see many veterans with mild TBI. Does cognitive therapy and compensatory strategies training
- Swallowing evaluation and treatment – bed side swallowing evaluation, modified barium swallowing test, and FEES (flourscopic endoscopic evaluation of swallowing)
- Speech evaluation and treatment – do standardized and informal assessment, compensatory strategy training, recommends oral prosthesis, electro-larynx
- Voice evaluation and treatment – functional and organic voice disorders, standardized testing and informal assessment, compensatory speech strategies
- Language evaluation and treatment – aphasia from stroke, brain tumors
- AAC and cognitive prosthetic devices- help with speech, memory, organization
- A perk of working at the VA is that there aren’t the funding issues that you normally have to deal with at other hospitals → can get expensive devices easily
- Train families and collaborate with them
- Why work in a hospital?
- great variety
- can work with children and adults, depending on the setting
- colloboration → team of SLPs, interdisciplinary tea, VA hospital system
team
- have flexibility of patients you would like to work with
- learning opportunities and continuing education
- challenging, never boring
- rewarding
- Why not work in the hospital? Long hours, not as much vacation, “yuck” factor
- Email: Anne.Preddy@va.gov → for questions and/or if you want to shadow
her
- What is the paperwork like? Taking her a while now because she is new at it. Everything is computerized. It’s a lot of paperwork.
How much individual vs. group therapy do you do? 80% individual, 20% group. Have stroke group, teaching how to use palm pilots for patients with cognitive deficits.

Blanca Hatim
- works at a highschool in Alhambra
- she likes working at a highschool because the kids can stay still, can have a conversation with them
- can work in public or private school
- district or agency paid
- not hard to find a job → when you do your externship, you will be offered a job
- find jobs at edjoin.org → helpful to start looking now so you get the hang of it
- sign up for Advance magazine → have job postings
Why School?
- kids, competitive salary, 10- month contract, extra pay for summer work, decent work schedule (7 or 8 hour day)
- all student holidays off, full health and medical benefits, retirement benefits, union support, peer support
Downsides?
- school budget cuts → conference and supplies, caseloads (state avg. 55), paperwork, reports (about the same as CSULA clinic)
- paperwork isn’t that bad for her since her caseload is 37 students
- variety of needs → MR, down syndrome, autism, Aspergers, specific learning disability, etc..
Variety of Needs
- work on semantics (vocabulary building), syntax (grammar, sentence structure), morphology (internal structure of words), pragmatics (social skills), voice, articulation, fluency (stuttering)
1st Year Requirement
- called CFY or RPE year
- requires supervision by licensed SLP

February 2nd, 2009 NSSLHA Meeting Minutes

2009-02-02T20:12:00.000-08:00

Speaker: Rebekah Taylor (SLP at a private practice)
- announcement about paying dues, signing up for email, registration
- announcement about free magazine called “Advanced for Speech Therapist” – sign up online or on phone
- Walk for Autism on April 25th →sign up on walknowforautism.org
- look on ASHA website for skills you need to obtain during CFY, gives focus on what you want from the experience
- pay attention to change in supervisor rules →supervisors need to take a class to become a supervisor
- must do everything in BLUE ink for forms for California State Board
- she did CFY in private practice
- environment completely different than what she expected
- works with 2 year old kids
- she felt like she suffered through it
- impossible to get all the information you need in a 2 year program → don’t go into your first year feeling like you have to know everything
- observe as many people as possible to get ideas for therapy
- don’t forget your sense of self, have confidence in yourself
- professionalism isn’t knowing all the answers, but knowing how to find them
Questions:
1.) What should we look for in a CFY? Figure out what you want first, where you want to work, which age group. Ask classmates about the hospitals or schools they work in. Garner relationships with SLPs, network.
2.) How much supervision did you receive? She didn’t get that much. Definitely talk about it with your supervisor beforehand. She had weekly meetings with supervisor, but didn’t have much actual observation. Don’t be afraid to ask for help.
Private Practice
- works at Briggsan Associates.
- Assessment, recommendation, treatment
- Parents are in the room during therapy
- Teach parents how to do therapy/strategies at home
- Work with the family, community in a team
- Initial assessments done as a team →2 people (one person records and interviews and one examines)
- Don’t give formal assessments, very play-based
- Best way to figure out a child is to figure out how they interact
- Giving a test doesn’t really give you an idea of what is going on with a child
- Sometimes give formal tests if school district requires it
- see kids birth-5 years old
Questions
1.) Can you choose the population you want to work with? Can’t get so specific with a specific disorder you want to work with; can choose age range you want to work with. Once you get into a CFY, you can request to your supervisor that you want clients with a specific disorder.
2.) What are the differences in load of paperwork, hours between private practice and school? She works 33 hours. She has 1 on 1 50 minute sessions with the parents. Out of the 33 hours, she has 27 booked with clients. Need to write notes at end of every session. Progress report every 6 months. All private pay; work with regional center, so don’t have to deal with insurance companies.
3.) How much vacation do you get? Vacation is based on hours worked. Get about 2 weeks off. Medical benefits not as great as working in a school.
4.) What is reverse swallowing? Babies stick out tongue to swallow. Can be a problem when you do this after infancy. In same category as tongue thrust.
5.) What problems do 18 months old have? Looking at where they are developmentally. Can work on getting their mouth moving, saying any sounds. Think about what they can do and start from there.
6.) What kind of diagnoses do the kids have? Developmental delay, dyspraxia
7.) What are the symptoms of developmentally delayed kids? Delayed in milestones for speech and language. Ask if they are receptively and/or expressively delayed?

Professional collaboration and referrals

2008-12-01T23:25:00.000-08:00

Notes from NSSLHA meeting, 11-17-08
Guest speaker: Dr. Maryann Abbott

CCS (California Children’s Services) provides medical, OT and PT services for children aged birth to 21, as well as durable medical equipment, with Medi-Cal dollars. Doctors who identify children with physical impairments should refer to CCS. They cover equipment such as wheelchairs, bath chairs, splints, braces, and communication devices. CCS needs SLP referral for communication devices, as well as written permission from doctors. SLP must refer with proof of medical necessity. CCS covers medical aspects—e.g. helping children to walk. The OT/PT at school provides services for access to the curriculum, so the eligibility is a little different than CCS eligibility. A student may potentially be eligible for one (CCS or school services) but not the other. OT’s, PT’s, doctors and case workers work for CCS, so they need to go through a private SLP, a non-public agency or a school to get speech-language reports.

The Regional Center is state funded. Depending on where you live, you are covered by a separate Regional Center. Each is a separate entity and may provide different services. Anyone can refer to the Regional Center for disabilities birth to 3. After the age of 3, services are taken up by the school district. If there is a cognitive or physical impairment, the Regional Center services are life-long. They provide services that are mostly related to daily living, such as diapering. They may cover respite care. They also pay for one conference a year for parents to go to, and after-school activities such as swimming lessons. This may even include transportation.

If a child has a disability, we have to go through CCS, which uses MediCal dollars, to get something like a communication device. If a student has either aged out of CCS or is not eligible for other reasons (e.g., undocumented) the Regional Center may provide services. Neither of these services employs SLP’s directly. It’s great to collaborate with specialists from the Regional Center (e.g., behaviorists) if possible, and have them come to the IEP meetings.

Low incidence disabilities includes: severe orthopedic, vision and hearing impairments. Some federal money is allotted for these students, so larger school districts may be able to purchase devices for these students. For students with autism, we may need to depend more on MediCal dollars or private insurance to cover communication devices. This works the same way as going to the doctor, including co-pay, deductible, and whatever else isn’t covered by insurance (e.g., 20% of cost).

Referrals: We might refer to OT’s if students are having trouble forming letters but can spell. Young children should be sitting independently by 6-7 months. Some children crawl late. Most children are beginning to walk by 12-15 months. Young children rake things in that they want, then use palmer grasp, then pincer grasp. Many children don’t get a hand dominance until the age of 5 or 6 years. There are some good developmental milestones online, but look at the Department of Health, National Institute of Health, or another reputable source. With autism there are usually referrals to OT for sensory integration or motor planning. However, some problems may be due more to attentional problems or sensory overload. Attention spans should be your developmental age, minus one (e.g., four minutes for the age of five), and it is also affected by interest level. If OT’s try something with them but it doesn’t make a difference for their attentional level, it’s probably not a sensory integration issue.

Make sure that you keep within your realm of practice and expertise. If we don’t, we breach ethics and may lose our license. OT’s work on tasks that require physical manipulation, motor planning or sensory integration. In the schools, it’s OT’s (not SLP’s) who provide swallowing services. Physical therapists work on range of motion. On a school campus, they may look at whether students can travel over different kinds of terrain and keep their balance, or whether they need equipment such as walkers or helmets.

Alumni Spotlight: Kristin Reisch, MA, CCC-SLP, Class of 2007

2008-11-25T23:00:00.000-08:00

(full article)

1. Where do you work, and how long have you been there?
I work at Presbyterian Intercommunity Hospital (PIH). I completed my externship at PIH and was then hired on as a full-time SLP. I began working as an employee in July 2007. I received my CCC’s last month!

2. Where did you work during your CFY? What is/was like, and how much support (from supervisors, fellow alumni, former professors, etc.) did you receive throughout that time?
I completed my CFY at PIH. It was a challenging experience. Going from being a student to the professional provided some new stresses in my life. Even though I always felt responsible as a student for the decisions I made, the ultimate responsibility lay with my extern supervisor. As a CFY (and now SLP with my C’s) the sense of responsibility for decisions made and their impact on patients was stressful.

3. What is a typical day for you?
Typical? What’s that? In the hospital setting we don’t really have typical days. I work in all areas of the hospital (critical care, intermediate care, acute care, transitional care, acute rehab, and outpatient) and on any given day I may see a patient from each area. The priority of each day is always new evaluations, followed by patients who are NPO, followed by patients on restricted diets, and then patients on less modified diets, with the speech-language/voice patients mixed in. If I have an outpatient he/she will take priority during their appointment time and then I will be back to in-patient care.

One of the benefits of working in a large hospital is the great diversity experienced almost every day with both population and disorder. One of the challenges is not really getting the opportunity to specialize and become an expert in one area.

4. What are the pros and cons about your job?
Pros:
· Educating patients and family re: their impairments; their prognosis, their plan of care, etc.
· Diversity in caseload, e.g., aphasia, dysphagia, apraxia, TBI, RHD, etc. In the hospital I get to see a wide variety of disorders most days.
· Good benefits/pay
· 4 day work week (10 hour days; the days are long but I have an extra day off during the week)
· For the most part the SLP’s at my hospital are well respected by the physicians, nurses, and other staff
· Patients and family who really appreciate the efforts we make to help them improve!
Cons:
· Working weekends and holidays
· Schedule changes throughout the day – so I might start with two evaluations and five therapy sessions, but if new evaluations come in or the patient I want to see is with PT or out for an MRI, etc. the therapy gets bumped – so it is hard to plan the day into a set schedule. (This is typical of acute care, so just comes with the territory.)

5. How long did it take you to feel comfortable/confident with your work?
I have been working at the hospital for about 11 months and am just starting to feel pretty confident. Although to be honest, I still have days or sessions when I feel like I am still a complete beginner. But I can say, after about a year, it does get better!

However, one thing you must always do in any setting is project confidence, regardless of how you feel! Our patients and their family members look to us as the experts and we must present ourselves as such. This does not mean to make stuff up when we don’t know, but to give the best information we have (and we really know more than we might think at first) and then go back with additional information as needed. If we don’t look confident our patients and family members will doubt our skills and expertise and be much less likely to follow through on our recommendations. So always, always, always project confidence!!

6. What is the most memorable moment of your career so far?
The day a former in-patient’s daughter called to thank me for always introducing myself to her dad and for always explaining why I was there. She was so genuinely appreciative of all I had done to help her dad go from NPO to oral gratification.

I treated him for probably about two weeks and each time I would introduce myself to him and his family. I just make this as a habit for each patient and sometimes think they must think I am wacky because I always re-introduce myself. However, patients are exposed to so many therapists, nurses, doctors, etc. in just one day we cannot expect them to remember us. In addition to telling him and the family who I was I always told them why I was there (e.g., “to work on your swallow,” or “to see how you are doing with eating,” etc.).

This daughter’s phone call helped me to know I was doing the right thing in constantly re-orienting the patient to his therapist and the purpose of my visit. Now I never doubt the need to tell them why I am there.

7. What do you wish you learned in grad school before hitting the real world?
I think ultimately I was as prepared as I could be. However, one thing to realize is that in grad school we typically learn all about textbook cases and theory. In the real world, people and their disorders rarely fall neatly into one specific category (e.g., only Wernicke’s Aphasia), but often have components of several impairments. Somehow this surprised me. Real people are much “messier” than the people in the books, be prepared to have to really mix your knowledge base up and blend!

8. Do you have any advice for the COMD students of CSULA (e.g., things to focus on, clinic advice, praxis tips, shout outs, etc.)?
· Buy a good penlight! I am not kidding, spend the $20.00 and get one with batteries that is well made and bright! It is well worth it and far, far, far superior to the cheapie free ones you collect from conventions, etc.
· Use the blue book and the accompanying CD for the Praxis; consider buying a 30 day (or so) subscription to : http://www.nespaexam.com/index.shtml (I really think this helped me), do not study the night before instead eat a healthy and yummy dinner, go to bed early, get to the test sight a little early (not too early!), and relax! You will find you are more prepared than you thought! After it is over, go out to lunch to celebrate!
· Remember grad school is only for two years, your career will be many, many years. You can do it! Team up with your classmates to study and relax together (our class started knitting together!). You are all in this together! Make the most of it!

Susan Simon- Los Angeles Unified School District

2008-10-26T22:50:00.000-07:00

(Notes from NSSLHA meeting, 10/20/08)

Benefits of working in LAUSD
• 700 square miles, 670,000 students aged 3-22 with a wide variety of disabilities, 300 SLP’s
• Urban or suburban settings
• Second largest district in USA, after NYC, which means that they can be cutting-edge in some ways with research in conjunction with local universities.
• Caseload variety; normally SELPA pools resources (e.g., DHH students in one district), but LAUSD is its own SELPA, so assignments may be arranged in many different ways depending on your area of interest
• Innovative programs, e.g. 3:1 model therapy:non-therapy, RTI intervention without IEP’s
• New therapist support—this is one of their strengths and one of the most important things for a new clinician. This is more than just CFY supervision, which may be very minimal. LAUSD provides good-quality master clinicians, professional development events, and 3 SLP’s who have part of their job away from the caseload, working with new therapists beginning with intensive training for a few weeks, and continuing supervision all year long. Additionally, you have CFY supervision as well as an administrator who does ongoing evaluation and support.
• Opportunities for advancement
• Good pay, starting at $61, 433 (180 workdays)/$70,756 (210 workdays) with master’s degree and CA license (special services pay scale). With credential (teacher’s pay scale), starting at $45,637-$72,592.
• District sponsored continuing education, where professionals are brought in to the district.
• Prevention and intervention services, following IDEA—to combat the “wait to fail” model, the focus is now on RTI (Response to Intervention) model.
• Web-based IEP’s and daily documentation
• LAUSD-provided laptop
• District-paid medical, dental, vision and mental health for you, spouse and children, as well as lifetime health benefits, life insurance, and STRS (state teacher’s retirement system) membership, which is a powerful pension fund.
• Paid holidays and illness leave—10 days of sick leave each year that rolls over if not used. Districts often don’t tell you that you can take sick leave with you when you leave a school district; it transfers with you to the new district.
• Loan forgiveness programs—up to $17,000 of Perkins Loan forgiven.
• Set of new materials and tests.

Employment requirements: online application, master’s degree, CBEST, letters of recommendation, health/TB clearance, fingerprint clearance, 2 sets of transcripts, etc.

For more information, contact:
Susan Simon, 213-241-3325, susan.simon@lausd.net
Wililam Hatrick, 213-21-5200, ext. 29176, william.hatrick@lausd.net
www.teachinla.com, recruit@lausd.k12.ca.us

Q and A at the meeting:

You can’t request a particular region to work in LAUSD. Assignments are partially based on seniority. If you’re brand-new, you need to stay in one school for at least 2 years. After that, LAUSD tries to give you one school that is based on preference (e.g., region, assignment) and the other is need-based. You will not be asked to drive more than 20-25 miles or sit in a car for too long. They try to keep therapists within the local district within LAUSD or the next one over.

LAUSD no longer hires clinicians on waivers, unless you are currently within a master’s program and that you can demonstrate clinical experience with diagnostics and therapy.

Caseload size- you are part of the union (UTLA) as an SLP, which is pretty powerful. Caseload is protected by union contract under class size. It’s capped at 55 with teacher’s salary, and 68 with SLP’s salary. If you want to take more, LAUSD will pay for it with teacher’s salary table. This is in your employment contract. To handle workload, LAUSD is moving to 3:1 model to help provide some down time.

SLPA’s- there are only 700 SLPA’s in California, but LAUSD is now in the process of hiring them. Because there are so many uncovered schools, children accrue compensatory time that SLPA’s will cover.

Dr. Susan Downey, plastic surgeon: cleft palate surgery in third world countries

2008-10-26T22:45:00.000-07:00

Notes from NSSLHA meeting, 10/6/08

Reconstructive surgery means to restore to the normal form or function (vs. cosmetic surgery). If the lip and/or palate doesn’t fuse, then form and function need to be restored.

Dr. Downey has been on 13 missions to different countries, but most recently she’s been focusing on Ecuador. Organizations she’s been with include Healing the Children, Interplast, and Operation Smile. The ultimate goal is to train people in other nations, and to go as teachers and educators. The type of palate repair surgery developed at CHLA is innovative and is not taught in other parts of the world. The advantage to this is that the muscles are repositioned and the palate is lengthened, which might result in little to no need for speech therapy following surgery.

Cleft lip/plate are among the most common birth defects worldwide, and are increased in areas with poor nutrition- especially folic acid. They affect an estimated 1 in 600 newborns. In some cases, there may be genetic components from smaller mating pools.

The goal is to operate on children or adults at any age. As long as children can eat appropriately, the need is not as urgent as with other surgeries. Palate repair in the US is ideally done at 1 year of age.

The team: nurses, anesthesia, plastic surgeons, medical records/coordinator, dentists, speech therapists, youth from a high school volunteer program, and med students.

Once in-country, Operation Smile does a screening of children. People find out about it through radios, churches, and non-profit organizations in the area. Because there is no back-up if things go wrong, they have to be careful not to operate on people with complicating medical conditions. Then they organize the charts to think about how they’re going to do the schedule of surgery. Because adults wake up slower from anesthesia, they have surgeries first in the day.

The airway is suddenly changed after surgery, so a “tongue stitch” can help bring the tongue forward and children are also placed on their side to help them breathe after surgery.

Operation on a cleft lip may take 45 minutes, whereas palate repair will take about 2 hours.

Some people walk for days and take the bus for hours afterward, in order to come for surgery. Often the father, then, is the one to accompany the child.

In surgery, they work closely with local doctors and anesthesiologists so that they can take over after the team leaves. Unfortunately, they don’t often get long-term follow-up, which is a problem for SLP’s—whose role is most effective when they do education with local professionals.

Operation Smile has training programs in the US also, to bring professionals for training. Occasionally children are also brought to the US for surgery. They often partner a lot with local organizations (e.g., Rotary Clubs, Mormon missionaries) overseas, and people in the community help with translation.

To find out about volunteer opportunities on these trips, consult the Operation Smile website or ask to accompany a speech therapist who has contacts in the community. The best way to get in is to be totally flexible in terms of time and say “call me if you have an opening”. If you speak another language, this increases the likelihood that they will need you. Some countries have stipulations on whether (or how) students can have a role on a team. Most trips last 1-2 weeks, with the first week for screening and the second week for operations.

FREE Offers from ASHA!

2008-10-09T23:45:00.000-07:00

1. Free 1 Month Trial of NSSLHA/ASHA Website

NSSLHA and ASHA are pleased to announce the launch of a NSSLHA national membership recruitment project on approximately 20 campuses early next month. Both associations, in partnership, will offer CSD students who are not currently national NSSLHA members on YOUR campus, a free, one-month trial subscription to ASHA's web site, www.asha.org .

www.nsslha.org/trial

Please note that national membership is different from a local chapter membership. Please note that access to the site will be available from October 1 – 31, 2008, regardless of the date students register for it, so the sooner they sign up (beginning on October 1), the longer their access will be.

2. Free Mentor Service from ASHA's STEP mentor Program

The Student to Empowered Professional (S.T.E.P.) program offers one-to-one mentoring for students enrolled in undergraduate, graduate and doctoral communication sciences and disorders programs. All students are eligible to apply, however, preference for program placement and matching with mentors will be given to those students from racial/ethnic backgrounds that have been historically underrepresented in the communication sciences and disorders professions. Students are strongly encouraged to
be national NSSLHA members in order to reap the full benefits of the S.T.E.P. mentoring program.

http://www.nsslha.org/students/gatheringplace/
http://www.asha.org/students/gatheringplace/step/menteeform

Who is "Abby?"

2008-09-30T14:03:00.000-07:00

Our "Abby" for the September newsletter was ......(drumroll please)........

Dr. Cari Flint!

Alumni Spotlight - Cindy Siu, MA, CCC-SLP, Class of 2002

2008-09-25T09:37:00.000-07:00

(full article)

Where did you work during your CFY? i worked at Little Company of Mary in San Pedro.

What is was like, and how much support (from supervisors, fellow alumni, former professors, etc.) did you receive throughout that time?
it was very informative and eye opening to get a taste of what responsibilities and duties are required of you in future professional arena. it was a good safe prep ground before entering into a hospital setting on my own. i was allowed to work with variety of outpts and inpts with many neurological, voice, speech, communication problems. the hospital also had a few outpatients who were children so that was fun to also have a diverse variety of ages as well.

Where do you work now? i currently work at little company of mary in torrance.

How long have you been working there? for 5 years, gosh time flies by!

What is a typical day for you at work? this is kind of a general question... but... i'll try to answer as best as i can. i get into work around 7:30/8:00 am, collect my referrals from the printer for the day, then prioritize my evals and treatments. the referrals can encompass anything from dysphagia evaluations, OPMS (a swallowing test), to speech/language/cognitive linguistic evaluations. after i finish with evaluations i proceed onto to priority patient treatments.

What are the pros and cons about your job?
PROS:
1. interdisciplinary team approach with all physicians and therapists working towards benefitting pts' physical and mental health as well as accomplishing their goals.
2. working with great coworkers who are very informative and listen to you.
3. very mentally stimulating and challenging at the same time- learning something new everyday on the job, medically, clinically, etc.
4. it's fun for me deal with different types of personalities on the job... from dealing with aggitated pts, to grateful family members, to educating uninformed nurses, to discussing and working on pt goals with other occupational and physical therapists.

CONS:
1. Nursing is not always compliant and sometimes do not follow through with our recommendations. this happens at all hospitals.
2. Hospital administration is often difficult to deal with for all therapists.
3. sometimes pts stay in 2 patient rooms and that gets a little distracting for my patient to focus on my therapy, especially if her/his roommate has visitors.

How long did it take you to feel comfortable/confident with your work? immediately! j/k i was pretty confident and prepared in regards to my clinical skills on site, i think it took a little bit more time to get used to the procedural aspects and computer system at the hospital. with hospital and paperwork procedures it took me probably 3 months before i was fully comfortable where i was working at.

What is the most memorable moment of your career? probably when i received the "employee of the month" award from among the entire hospital staff/facility. it just validates that i'm in the right profession and that my patients and coworkers appreciate all the hard i do.

What do you wish you learned in grad school before hitting the real world? there are many skills you learn on-site rather than in grad school. i think majority of skills you acquire is based on hands on experience as with most professions. .....mmmmhhh.....i think my graduate program really prepped me for the real world setting.

Do you have any advice for the graduate students of CSULA?
Yes, it's not all about the money as long as you have the passion!!!