Communication Sciences & Disorders

Implementing Effective Treatment Practices with CLD Children

Overview

The Implementing Treatment Practices (ITP) Project is a four-year (2009-2013) for which we anticipate funding through the Office of Special Education, U.S. Department of Education.

Project Goals

Provide students with:

Knowledge about effective treatment practices for CLD children with communication disorders.
Enhanced clinical learning opportunities (ECLO) in school and research settings.
Training on how to collaborate with regular and special educators teachers, and provide in-service training to other professionals.

ITP Project Competencies

The ITP Project strengthens and improves the competencies of students in order that they may better serve children with communication disorders who come from CLD backgrounds. The project has training in three areas: academic, clinical, and professional training designed to address competencies that focus on the development and implementation of effective treatment practices.

Project Commitments

Attend biweekly student/faculty meetings
Participate in 50 hours of project related experiences per semester
Enroll in the required specialized activities
Comply with the U.S. Department of Education “pay back” requirement.
Student must be a U.S. citizen or resident.

Project Activities

Students will participate in enhanced clinical learning experiences that focus on assessment and intervention with children, and clinical efficacy in service delivery to children with communication disorders from Culturally and Linguistically Diverse backgrounds

ITP Project trainees will have opportunities to gain clinical and research skills while working on the following:

School based Response to Intervention (RTI) experiences accompanied by onsite volunteering, tutoring.
HABLA Lab Projects including Diagnostic Markers of Language Impairment in Bilingual Children and Phenotype Tools for Language Impairment in Bilingual children.
Treatment studies and related activities in the Developmental Stuttering Lab.

Student Funding

All interested students are invited to apply for participation in the ITP Project. Interested students

may apply for funding in the form of a tuition/fees and book stipend. Some out of state tuition assistance is available.

Project Faculty

Lisa Bedore, Ph.D. Director

Dr. Bedore's research focuses on language learning and language impairment in bilingual children with a special focus on grammatical impairments.

Liz Peña, Ph.D. Co-director

Dr. Peña conducts research in the areas of semantic development and dynamic assessment applied to Spanish and English children.

Courtney Byrd, Ph.D. Co-director

Dr. Byrd conducts research in the area of stuttering in young children. She has a special interest in testing the effectiveness of treatment for children who stutter.

Anita M. Perez, Ph.D. Coordinator

Dr. Perez specializes in bilingual special education, and Spanish/English literacy issues. She has developed a summer program to build the language skills of kindergarten and first grade ELL children.

Melissa White, M.A. CCC-SLP Clinical Mentor

Ms. White's interest focus on communication disorders Spanish English bilinguals and Response to Intervention. She has developed school based intervention and RTI experiences.

Ann Brown, M.A. CCC-SLP Clinical Mentor

Mrs. Brown's is interested in speech and language disorders in preschool and school age children. She has developed programs for teaching text comprehension and writing to school age students.

Department of Communication Sciences & Disorders
1 University Station, A1100
The University of Texas at Austin
Austin, Texas 78726
(512) 232-2364
(512) 471-2407