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Current Doctoral Candidates
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Julie Beard
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Work History I have worked with several populations since graduate school. My first job was with children and adults with profound mental retardation living at a residential facility. I began to favor working with clients having behavioral issues at that time. Following this were jobs at two more residential facilities, one for adults with head trauma and the other with children experiencing emotional and behavioral disorders. I felt very much at home with this population and realized at the time that these children were the ones I favored most. I have always gravitated toward clients with emotional or behavioral issues and have enjoyed working with this population. I had two more jobs, public school and private practice, before “retiring.” I believed at the time that I was finished with my professional career, but I did keep my CCCs and state licensure up-to-date “just in case.” I have learned that things happen in life that you don’t expect. Thank goodness I maintained my professional credentials! Retirement lasted only 2½ years and I jumped at the chance to work at UALR. I taught some undergraduate classes and supervised in the clinic. I loved working with the students, teaching clinical skills, and watching them become more proficient at providing therapy. I loved working with professionals who taught me to love my career again and to think about it in a different way. I worked at UALR until August 2006, when I began my doctoral training.
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Reasons for wanting a Ph.D. When I began working at UALR, I heard other faculty members talk about their research. Prior to this time, research was not something I had thought much about or had much desire to do. However, while listening to these researchers who were so genuinely eager to discover new information and share it with others, I began to see research as an exciting and rewarding path. It was inspiring to listen to them. I began to understand that discovering new information and sharing it with others will allow me to help many more clients that I could ever do on a personal level. When the doctoral program opened, it seemed like a natural choice to combine my love for working at a university and my passion for children with emotional and behavioral disorders. My research faculty mentor is Dr. Dee Lance. I chose Dr. Lance because her area of interest in child language and because I respect her passion for learning and her enthusiastic and encouraging attitude. I am interested in investigating whether social stories are an effective treatment option with children experiencing language as well as emotional and behavioral disorders for a pre-dissertation research project. This will involve developing a specific story for each child to help them achieve success in social situations. Future Goals My focus at the moment is to learn what I need to learn in my doctoral program. I am not concerned at the moment about where I will work or how quickly I will finish my program. When I am ready, I hope to teach, work with students in the clinic, and conduct research at the university level.
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Joy Good
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Work History Following my graduation, my first place of employment was United Cerebral Palsy. Here I gained invaluable experience working with children ranging in age from infants to toddlers and preschoolers with a variety of disabilities. I was able to work on a transdisciplinary team and come to appreciate the role each member plays in enriching the child’s life. Subsequently, I returned to my hometown where I worked for eight years in the public school system working primarily with children in the second through sixth grades. While I missed working with the “little ones,” it was in the schools that I became impassioned about the importance of literacy and the role that SLP’s can play in this area.
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Reasons for wanting a Ph.D.
During my graduate school training, I knew even during my graduate school training, I knew
that someday I would return to pursue a Ph.D. However, the years I
spent working in the field served to strengthen my clinical skills
and narrow my focus on the area in which I would pursue
specialization-Childhood Language with an emphasis in Literacy.
During my time in the public schools, I came to appreciate the
significant role that language plays in a child’s academic success.
Related to this also is literacy and its substantial impact as well.
I desired to further my education in this area. I also was able to
gain experience with the supervision of graduate students during my
career in the public schools. This proved to be something I enjoyed
as well. Obtaining a Ph.D will provide me the opportunity to combine
working with children and graduate students while actively
participating in research in this area.
My research faculty mentor is Dr. Lance.
Currently, we are investigating the efficacy of a direct spelling
instruction’ intervention on the phonemic awareness, reading, and
spelling skills of both normal language and language impaired first
grade students. It is hoped that this will prove to an effective
means of achieving gains in these areas. | |
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Laura Lynn Shotts
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Work History My first place of employment was KIDSource, Inc. I provided evaluation and treatment for children of various ages, but primarily worked with children ages birth to 3 years old. I completed my CFY, and worked at KIDSource for a total of 14 months prior to beginning the PhD program.
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Reasons for wanting a Ph.D. My interest in pursuing a PhD began early in my graduate studies. My first Master’s level class was research methods. I knew at that early stage in my graduate education I wanted to obtain a PhD. Working as a graduate assistant and completing a thesis further increased my doctoral aspirations. These opportunities provided insight into the research community as well as the rewards of teaching and the time and preparation required. I want a PhD in order to advance the speech-language pathology field through research activities as well as educating students through teaching academic and clinical skills. My research faculty mentor is Dr. Guyette. I am currently reviewing the literature in the area of cleft palate. Specifically, I am interested in the effects of velopharyngeal fatigue on speech in individuals with cleft palate for a pre-dissertation research project. This will involve individuals with cleft palate speaking for an extended period of time. Perceptual nasality, nasalence, and pressure-flow measures will be taken periodically in order to measure whether fatigue of the velopharyngeal mechanism increases nasality in speakers with cleft palate. I am also pursuing the possibility of incorporating my second area of interest, voice and voice disorders, with my cleft palate interests. | |
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Sheryl S. Shoemaker
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Work History For over six years I provided audiological services at a rehabilitation hospital while also providing part-time teaching and clinical supervision at Louisiana Tech University. In 2000 I joined Louisiana Tech University as an Instructor while completing my clinical doctorate in Audiology. In 2001, I was promoted to Assistant Professor where I taught courses and supervised graduate students in clinical practicum. Beginning in 2005, I was appointed as the Coordinator of the Doctor of Audiology Program at Louisiana Tech University. I recently received tenure and promotion and have been appointed as Interim Head of the Department of Speech.
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Reasons for wanting a Ph.D. In recent years I have become increasingly interested in research centered around children with auditory processing disorders. While I have had previous course work in research, it was not to the level that would allow me to create complex research designs and to be able to analyze the data. As a personal goal, obtaining this knowledge will help prepare me to conduct the kind of research that is of interest to me and also help me to guide other faculty members and students in conducting research.
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Future Goals I would like to be able to contribute meaningful research to better assist children with auditory processing disorders.
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Cherin Pace
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Work History After fifteen years as a practicing dental hygienist, I made the scary and exciting decision to return to school and decided on speech-language pathology. I graduated in 1999, which was unfortunate timing, as this was about the same time that Medicare made changes in the reimbursement policies for rehabilitative services and the job opportunities for speech pathologists working with adults decreased dramatically. With a rather strong twist of irony, I accepted a position on the UAMS dental hygiene faculty and found that I love teaching and working with students both in the classroom and in the clinical setting. In August 2001, I completed my clinical fellowship at UAMS. My responsibilities included seeing inpatients and outpatients to administer diagnostic assessments and provide therapeutic intervention for patients with dysphagia, speech, voice, and language disorders. The 18 month Clinical Fellowship Year at the University Hospital was a fantastic learning and growing experience, which confirmed that my primary interest as a speech-language pathologist was in the medical realm of the profession. I am active in the professional associations for dental hygiene and speech-language pathology at both the national and state levels. At the local level, I have been pleased to be invited to provide continuing education course presentations to the ArkSHA annual convention in Hot Springs and the Central District ASDHA.
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Reasons for wanting a Ph.D. My interest in a PhD began when I was ten years old and my dad got his. Even though I didn’t have a clue what it was all about, I was impressed and ever since then I have wanted to be “Dr. Pace” like my dad. Since the completion of my CFY, I have concentrated on the advancement of my dental hygiene faculty position, but have maintained my SLP licensure and certification with the hope of returning to the field. I find now that I am ready for a new challenge and different direction and, given my love of speech pathology and of teaching, that new direction is clear. Dr. Richard Zraick is my mentor and advisor. Like me, he has a persnickety nature, shares my interest in all things neurogenic, is a fellow rock and roller, and has a high tolerance of my bizarre sense of humor.
Future Goals There is clearly much more to learn about the brain including its role in speech and language function, which is why I have chosen adult neurogenics as my primary research interest (yes, I know this will have to be narrowed down!) and dysphagia as secondary. As far as a collateral area goes, I have a number of ideas, but have not decided yet. My short term goals are 1) to enhance my research skills through additional coursework, literature review, and research projects, 2) to pursue additional training, experience, and expertise in the areas of neurogenic and motor speech disorders for the pursuit of research as well as to increase my overall knowledge base, and 3) figure out a dissertation topic. The fulfillment of these goals will assure that I will have the necessary tools to meet my long term goal which is to obtain a faculty position in a graduate speech-language pathology program. As an educator at this level, I anticipate that my responsibilities will include didactic instruction and clinical supervision, for which I have gained invaluable experience the past eight years. Additionally, I look forward to the new challenge of pursuing my own research as well as the opportunity to direct student research activities. | |||
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Erin Kamarunas
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Work History Following my graduation, I accepted a position to complete my CFY with Delta Rehab at Spring Creek Living Center, a nursing home. At Spring Creek I worked with patients on language, cognitive, and swallowing/feeding goals and was able to get experience working with the special population of the elderly. I was able to work on a transdisciplinary team and was able to learn a lot from the knowledge and experience they had.
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Reasons for wanting a Ph.D. During clinical training in the Master’s program, I had a year long clinical at St. Vincent Infirmary during which I participated in and gained experience in swallow studies and swallowing therapy techniques. It was during this hands-on experience that I was to realize my deep interest in dysphagia. This interest built during my CFY as I had several dysphagia patients at the nursing home. Half-way through my CFY I realized that I wanted to pursue further study of this topic and I applied to the graduate school. My research faculty member is Dr. Gary McCullough and I am studying and researching adult and pediatric dysphagia.
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