College of Applied Health Sciences | Page 14 | College of Applied Health Sciences

SHS Clinic gives students, faculty the opportunity to provide clinical services for the community

May 15, 2023 | Bruce Adams

The Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic is located at 201 S. Oak Street in Champaign
(Photo provided)

Nestled in the University of Illinois’ Research Park is a place where the Department of Speech and Hearing Science improves communication and quality of life using evidence-based practices on a daily basis. This mission goes back to the founding of the department.

The Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic, operated by SHS, provides a full range of diagnostic and therapeutic services to 200 children and adults annually. The clinic serves individuals in the local community and across Illinois via in-person and telepractice means, providing services to clients across the lifespan.

May is Better Hearing and Speech Month, and 2023 marks the 50th anniversary of the celebration of that occasion, as well as the 50th anniversary of SHS being established at the University of Illinois. The month’s theme of Building a Strong Foundation and its emphasis on “life-altering treatment” fit nicely with the department’s history of service, instruction and research.

During the month free pediatric and adult hearing and speech-language screenings will be offered to community members. Graduate students will perform the screenings with supervision from certified audiologists and speech-language pathologists. The event will be held at the clinic at 2001 S. Oak St. Suite B in Champaign on the morning of Wednesday, May 24, and the afternoon of Thursday, May 25. All are welcome and can call the clinic at 217-333-2205 if interested in scheduling a free screening.

Other community activities have included:

Presentations from second-year masters students at the OSF Heart of Mary Medical Center stroke support group’s monthly meeting.
Presentations at the Parkinson’s Disease Support Group of Champaign County about the role of speech-language pathology and its benefits for quality of life in Parkinson’s disease.
Convenient, no-charge audiology and hearing care services provide to residents of Clark Lindsey Nursing Home. Doctor of Audiology students informed residents about listening and repair strategies, cleaned and maintained hearing aids, and cleaned earwax out of residents’ ears.
Free hearing and speech-language screenings at the Child Development Laboratory on campus and at Chesterbrook Academy Preschool.
Sharing information about communication disorders and the services available at the clinic with the community as part of the College of Applied Health Sciences booth at the Urbana Market on the Square.

Graduate students in audiology and speech-language pathology develop knowledge and skills to provide clinical care to the community through their academic coursework and clinical practica experiences.

“As a clinic, we’re working very closely with the department,” said Clarion Mendes, a speech-language pathologist at the clinic and a clinical assistant professor in SHS. As Mendes explains, exposure to the needs of the community in the clinic informs teaching.

“Part of our mission is to intertwine the two and not see them as distinct entities,” she said. “The department has gone through a curriculum revision for the master’s program in recent years that highlights cultural and linguistic diversity, and if we look at that with a broader lens, that also includes looking at speech differences rather than considering them as disabilities. Speaking for myself, my clinical population nearly exclusively consists of marginalized populations. I work nearly exclusively with gender-diverse individuals. Working within that landscape requires a lot of reflection and cultural humility, constantly revising how I approach clinical practice and teach it to my students.”

The clinic gives students the unique opportunity to provide cutting-edge care informed by research and clinical expertise in an immersive environment under the supervision of licensed and nationally certified audiologists and speech-language pathologists. While clients are receiving care, they are contributing to new discoveries in the assessment and treatment of communication disorders and training the next generation of speech, language, and hearing clinicians and researchers.

Working with external partners and increasing the diversity of the student body bring fresh viewpoints and experiences to the clinic and department. In fact, the international composition in the clinical programs body is at a 10-year high, with seven international students in the clinical programs in audiology and speech-language pathology. “Efforts are also underway to expand the accepted insurances to get a broader patient base,” Clinical Assistant Professor Sadie Braun said.

Clinical work powers education and research and has motivated SHS since its humble beginnings. Jennifer Dahman, a speech-language pathologist and clinical assistant professor at SHS, credits her work as a clinical educator for making her a “better speech-language pathologist.”

“Yes, we teach the how, but more importantly, we teach the why,” she said. “And if we don’t know the why then we find out. Being able to explain that active kind of learning perspective to students translates into their service delivery.”

Learn more about the Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic by visiting the website.

Return to the SHS at 50 page

Tags: Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology Clinic, SHS at 50

Can you understand me, Siri?

May 21, 2024 | Anna Flanagan

*The Speech Accessibility Project aims to amass a database of audio recordings from people with disabilities that affect their speech. (Getty Images)*

Speech recognition software such as Alexa, Google Assistant, Amazon Echo, Cortana and Siri allow anyone to access information and use smart home technologies through spoken questions and commands. At least, that’s what they’re supposed to do. Unfortunately, these devices typically don’t recognize speech that is affected by a disability.

Mark Hasegawa-Johnson, professor of electrical and computer engineering at Illinois, wants to change that. He launched the Speech Accessibility Project (SAP), which aims to amass a database of audio recordings from people with disabilities that affect their speech. Volunteers with Parkinson’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), stroke-related disabilities, cerebral palsy and Down syndrome record responses to three different types of prompts to capture commands, phonetically diverse speech such as one might produce when reading aloud, and conversational speech.

SHS Associate Professors Laura Mattie and Marie Moore Channell are leading the Illinois Down Syndrome Team. “People with Down syndrome have intelligibility issues so it’s common for them to not be understood at all or to be misunderstood by voice recognition systems,” Mattie said. And it’s not just that it’s the hot new thing, as Channell observed. “These systems are among the strategies we put into place to make life easier for people with disabilities,” she said. One can imagine the frustration that results from being unable to use technologies that are supposed to improve your life.

Mattie said she and Channell put a lot of effort into developing the prompts for the recordings “…to make them representative of the kinds of things for which individuals would be using the software.” Added Channell, “It’s about making sure on the front end that the recordings are valuable and representative so that what goes into the database is relevant.”

The Speech Accessibility Project database initially will be available to the consortium of technology companies that are funding the project, including Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta and Microsoft, before becoming widely available to the public.

Tags: Clarion Mendes, College of Applied Health Sciences, Marie Moore Channell, Speech Accessibility Project

RST alumna Simmons discusses the importance of giving back

July 25, 2024 | Sam Rink

*RST alumna Julie Simmons has joined AHS’ Board of Visitors (Photo provided)*

Pivotal. That is how Julie Simmons, chief operating officer and co-founder of Paragon Marketing Group, described her experience earning a master’s degree in Recreation, Sport and Tourism at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. The experience not only influenced her successful career in sports marketing, but also led her to where she is now, continually offering her generosity to the community that fostered her professional growth.

“When you truly learn and you really take to heart the lessons from your college experiences, I think you naturally want to give back to and support the institution that shaped you,” Simmons said.

Simmons has spent much of her career giving back to her alma mater, opening Paragon’s doors to current students in the form of mentorship and scholarships. The company sponsors four scholarships—one within Illinois’ own RST program as well as at Northern Illinois University, Illinois State University and DePaul University.

For years, Paragon has also facilitated a number of internships with students in RST, as well as from other area universities.

“We strive for diversity in our recruitment, but supporting institutions within Illinois is particularly important to us,” Simmons said. “And because many of these applicants are local, it reduces the financial burden of internships and makes these opportunities more accessible.”

Internships at Paragon offer hands-on experience with sports marketing, priming students to work on a wide variety of client projects. According to Simmons, interns are exposed to different areas of the business including strategy, event logistics and planning, providing them with a broad understanding of the industry.

“For us, it’s about providing interns with a positive, real-world experience that equips them with the knowledge they need to pursue a career in sports marketing,” she said.

But Simmons didn’t want to stop at simply providing internships and scholarships. She is now part of the College of Applied Health Sciences’ Board of Visitors, an advisory board of volunteer alumni who aim to assist and advocate for the college’s goals. Simmons was nominated to the board in January of 2024 by Jean Driscoll, the assistant dean for advancement, who said “her [Simmons’] experience, leadership, and passion for service make her a wonderful addition to the board. Her accomplishments are too numerous to name, and the BOV will be a beneficiary of her talents and ideas.”

“I’m truly excited and honored that Jean nominated me for this position,” Simmons said. “For me, this is another way to give back to a place where I experienced tremendous growth.”

Simmons not only has her own professional expertise and experience on the corporate side of scholarships to offer the board, but also her unique experience as a woman owner in a male-dominated industry.

“When I started out, I was often the only woman in a room full of men, and that’s still often the case,” she said. “One of the most important things I learned was the value of finding advocates for myself and other women. Building that support network is crucial. When I worked at the University of Illinois in the athletic environment, I was the only woman on the promotions team for quite a while. Despite that, everyone was welcoming and open, showing me that you can coexist and support each other.”

Those experiences of positive mentorship are a large part of Simmons’ motivation to join the Board of Visitors, but she has yet another personal connection that draws her toward supporting an institution of learning. Simmons, being the first person in her family to go to college, has a particular appreciation for the privilege of higher education, especially for going on to receive her master’s degree from Illinois.

“If I didn’t have others helping me along the way, great mentors to guide me and people encouraging me to expand my horizons, I wouldn’t be where I am today. That’s what I want to do, as well. I want to provide others with the information they need, whether it’s about the sports industry, being a woman business owner or the importance of education. It’s all about paying it forward.”

Simmons reflected on the impact of a positive learning environment on her career and how it has influenced her and her peers to continue working with the university, recalling her time working with Michael Raycraft, a clinical associate professor in RST, and Stephen Staples, a member of the board.

“That’s why it was pivotal for me, and that’s why I feel very passionate about trying to give something back to something that really helped me.”

When it comes to her future on the board, Simmons expressed her excitement to join the Nominating and Governance Committee.

“I’m excited to be able to bring my background and experience,” she said. “I look forward to contributing substance and value to our initiatives. I’m excited to get some more meat on the bones.”

Tags: alumni, College of Applied Health Sciences, Julia Simmons

Stout Leadership

Jan. 15, 2024 | Bruce Adams

Alumna’s return to DRES provides continuity at a pivotal pointry of the article that hooks the reader

*Heather Stout returned to the University of Illinois from the School of Law at St. Louis University and has roots in Central Illinois (Photo by Ethan Simmons)*

When Disability Resources and Educational Services, better known as DRES, began advertising for a permanent director of operations in 2023, it was apparent to current employees who would be a great fit.

“Before there was ever the possibility of Heather [Stout] becoming DRES director of operations, my mentor and the first DRES director I worked for, Dr. Brad Hedrick, mentioned her as one of his respected colleagues working at a peer institution,” said Susann Sears, director of Beckwith Residential Support Services, which is affiliated with DRES and provides care for disabled students.

Stout was hired in June and officially joined DRES in August, succeeding interim Director Kim Collins, who retired at the end of June. Stout returned to DRES with established relationships in hand.

“I worked closely with Susann Sears, because she and I were in similar roles at [the University of Illinois Chicago] and Illinois, respectively,” Stout said. “Paige Lindahl-Lewis [assistant director at Beckwith] and I graduated from AHS together. Paige and I both graduated from rehab programs when I graduated from Illinois.”

Stout returned to the University of Illinois from the School of Law at St. Louis University and has roots in Central Illinois. She got her bachelor’s degree from Penn State and a master’s in rehab counseling at Illinois, interning at DRES along the way. Stout emphasized the values of continuity.

“It’s important that Illinois has some long-term staff that have historical knowledge and cultural context for DRES and our program,” she said. “In higher ed, there have been a lot of changes across universities, particularly in disability. It’s good that there has been consistency at DRES, along with some of the changes in staffing.”

Maureen Gilbert, DRES’ coordinator for the unit’s Office of Campus Life, agreed that Stout’s understanding of the university was a huge plus.

“Her familiarity with campus and DRES is helpful because she understands the impact and presence DRES has,” Gilbert said. “With Heather’s experience and knowledge base, she can advocate for a strong presence at the table, especially when the discussion involves disability and accommodations across all aspects of the campus community.”

That’s especially important because of the tremendous growth in DRES student enrollment.

Gilbert said that “in four years, our numbers have increased 33 percent. Our access specialists have caseload numbers of 600 to 700 students; we have waitlists for mental health services counseling and neuropsych testing; and our service requests for deaf and hard-of-hearing students and staff are increasing. To continue supporting students and their growing needs, increased financial resources are essential to support current and prospective staff.”

Her familiarity with campus and DRES is helpful because she understands the impact and presence DRES has.

Maureen Gilbert

DRES coordinator, Office of Campus Life

Fulfilling the DRES mission and serving increasing enrollment will require expanded facilities. To that end, Stout said a new facility is necessary. She has seen proposed building designs and said, “It is my hope that in the next five years, we can talk more about that and what we can do to make DRES and each of the departments centrally located. That’s a very thoughtful conversation we’ll need.”

Stout referenced the Center for Movement and Performance, a proposed state-of-the-art, stand-alone indoor multi-use facility for the wheelchair track and wheelchair basketball programs with enhanced strength and conditioning, equipment, sports medicine, training and meeting areas.

Adam Bleakney, renowned coach of the men’s and women’s wheelchair track and road racing teams, said, “We have a vision for a facility that is built upon the legacy pillars of our program—service, outreach, research, education and innovation—and that will allow us both room for growth and increased interdisciplinary collaboration across campus and the community.”

Although facility upgrades are high on her list of things to do, Stout acknowledged the priority is “serving the entire student.”

“We have a career services area,” she said. “We have mental health resources. One of the things I hope to expand upon is our connections with each academic department. Are we working with and partnering with them so that students are getting the accommodations that they need and each unit can work with us effectively? And are we doing what is best for graduate and professional students, as well as the faculty and administration in those programs?”

Early in her career, Stout worked as an interim coordinator/disability specialist at the University of Illinois Chicago, and worked as director of the Disability Resource Center at Purdue University.

She said Purdue’s approach to disability was “very methodical, very careful” and said Illinois had a similar approach.

“Illinois was the first model for disability resources in higher ed. It includes programs that few universities have,” Stout said. “It also has tremendous support. Being located within an academic college is a crucial connection for faculty and students. Our history is unparalleled in the U.S. and continues to include incredible resources. I hope to build upon that legacy as we look to the future and envision what DRES can be five years and 10 years from now.”

Tags: DRES, Heather Stout, Moving Forward

AHS students find varied paths to research

April 28, 2023 | Ethan Simmons

Dozens of students from AHS lined the walls of Huff Hall to present findings from their recent research endeavors.

*Kinesiology senior Ilya Ahmad stands with his research presentation on Wednesday, April 26, 2023.*

By ETHAN SIMMONS

For her last semester as an undergraduate student, Daniela Hernandez spent a lot of time in campus libraries—more than the Community Health major had in her entire college career.

But all of Hernandez’s hours in the Main Stacks and Grainger Engineering Library went toward a worthy cause: conducting a literature review for her first research study, exploring the labor market value of Spanish-English bilingualism.

“It was very ambitious of me to do this my last semester of college, but it was something that I had never done before,” Hernandez said. “So I was like, ‘Why not?’”

Hernandez is enrolled in the Illinois Academic Enrichment and Leadership Program or I-LEAP, a support and mentorship program for underrepresented minority students, student-athletes and first-generation students in the College of Applied Health Sciences such as her.

“I’m excited to pass this on to my (I-LEAP) mentee and just say, ‘Hey, this is a great opportunity to develop those skills that you might not have,” she said.

Dozens of students from AHS lined the walls of Huff Hall on Wednesday to present findings from their recent research endeavors working in the labs of their mentors. The presentations coincided with the university-wide Undergraduate Research Symposium on April 27.

Plenty of paths exist for AHS undergrads looking for research involvement. There’s Students Pursuing Applications, Research and Knowledge (SPARK), which onboards high-achieving freshmen into research programs within the college, and Student Aging Researchers in Training (START), which brings students from underrepresented backgrounds into aging research.

Department of Speech and Hearing Science juniors Natalia Rzepa and Holly Panfil found their first research experiences through START and SPARK, respectively.

Both found their way into in SHS Associate Professor Raksha Mudhar’s Aging and Neurocognition Lab and stuck around because they liked it so much.

With SHS doctoral candidate Lizzy Lydon and School of Molecular and Cellular Biology senior Sharbel Yako, the group compared brain activity between older adults and younger adults during word recall tests.

Though both groups performed comparably in the test, event-related spectral perturbation data collected from participants suggested older adults had to use higher levels of neural compensation during the exercise, Panfil said.

“Research opens a lot of doors, and I think that we’re so lucky to be at a university that has so many different labs and ways to get involved,” said Panfil, who’s heading for a Fulbright-MITACS Globalink research internship in Canada this summer. “I’d really recommend it to anyone to just give it a shot.”

For Recreation, Sport and Tourism sophomores Genna Peters and Vanessa Ramos, their presentation “Developing a Quality Evaluation Protocol for Racial Equity Park and Recreation Plans” was just a snapshot of their progress. Working with mentors RST Associate Professor Mariela Fernandez and doctoral student Wonjin Jeong, the students will reach out to community members.

Ramos, who transferred to Illinois from DePaul, called her first stab at research “a great experience.”

“Being able to learn how to work as a group, collect data, and just having someone to guide me through my first year at UIUC has been very helpful,” Ramos said.

“Research opens a lot of doors, and I think that we’re so lucky to be at a university that has so many different labs and ways to get involved. I’d really recommend it to anyone to just give it a shot”

Holly Panfil

Undergraduate in Speech and Hearing Science

Especially for underclassmen, joining a study can seem an intimidating task. Community Health sophomore Afnaan Afsar Ali transferred into AHS late last year, wanting a “broader outlook” on healthcare, but didn’t initially care for exploring any research opportunities.

“I think there’s a lot of fear when you first begin to try and get into a research lab,” Afsar Ali said. “But it does get easier, the whole purpose of research is so that you are able to develop as well.”

However, some of the college’s work with health technology caught her interest. She contacted the Human Factors and Aging Laboratory led by KCH Professor Wendy Rogers, which connected the sophomore to an interview-based project involving sociable robot “Misty,” one of which exists inside the McKechnie Family LIFE Home.

The project titled “Understanding the Role of a Socially Assistive Robot to Successfully Age in Place” surveyed eight older adults on their comfortability and interest in the open-source programmable robot after seeing videos of Misty in action.

The eight adults, surveyed from across the country, all had warm responses on Misty’s appearance, size and functions, Afsar Ali said. Participants came up with three main use areas for the robotic companion: Completing domestic tasks, setting daily reminders, and socializing at home.

Afsar Ali assisted in the literature review, sifting through previous research on the role of robots and health tech in the lives of older adults, and helped conduct video conference interviews with participants.

“I realized that we have a really big misconception about how older adults feel about technology,” Afsar Ali said. “I thought that they wouldn’t be open to it at all, but they really are—they want to be involved and have more technology in their lives, things that can support them.”

With a bit of luck, undergrads can find research labs that perfectly fit their interests. Fitness buff Ilya Ahmad, a senior in Kinesiology, combined two of his favorite topics for his presentation: working out and hormone function.

Under KCH Assistant Professor Diego Hernandez-Saavedra, Ahmad reviewed the effects of anabolic steroids on the body. He discussed how steroids impedes the body’s ability to produce testosterone, which can cause decreases in testicular size, sperm count and sex drive. Steroids can also cause other hormone dysregulation, and even cause DNA damage, he said.

A first-generation student, Ahmad said he had “no idea about research” when he came to the University of Illinois. He wants to attend medical school after graduation, but knows he wants to keep research in his life.

“I love research. I love endocrinology,” Ahmad said. “It’s kind of cool to show people things that are based on research findings.”

Find out more about the AHS Undergraduate Research Expo at this site, including a list of all projects.

Editor’s note:

To reach Ethan Simmons, message him at ecsimmon@illinois.edu.

Tags: I-LEAP, McKechnie Family Life Home, Raksha Mudar, Undergraduate Research Symposium, Wendy Rogers

Anatomy of a pioneer: Willard R. Zemlin

April 04, 2023 | Bruce Adams

*Willard Zemlin, right, uses an early research lab setup to examine the adult oral cavity (Illinois archives)*

Willard R. Zemlin was fascinated by how speech and hearing work. He brought an array of skills and interests to the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. Born in Two Harbors, Minn., he worked in radio and television repair and electronics, was a locomotive engineer with the Duluth, Missabe & Iron Range Railroad and served as a sergeant in the infantry with the U.S. Army in Korea.

Zemlin completed a bachelor’s degree in experimental psychology and a master’s degree in speech pathology at the University of Minnesota. The work done by his wife, Eileen, in speech pathology inspired him to leave his job and pursue a Ph.D. in speech pathology with a focus on vocal science.

Zemlin began making the connection between instruction, clinical practice and research when he joined the Illinois faculty as an assistant professor of Speech and Hearing Science in 1962.

Zemlin directed the Speech and Hearing Research Laboratory from 1962 to 1975. He undertook a systematic and comprehensive investigation of the anatomy and physiology of speech, language and hearing systems. He utilized his considerable photographic skills (with the permission and assistance of the School of Basic Medical Sciences at Illinois) in the laboratory to capture images from stages of the dissection process and used the pictures to supplement his lectures to enhance his students’ understanding of the structures related to human communication. For students, the opportunity to see structures, as opposed to reading about them, clarified the subject matter and made it more interesting.

Zemlin was promoted to associate professor in 1966 and to professor in 1971, with an appointment as professor in the School of Clinical Medicine recognizing his expertise in the anatomical functioning of hearing and speech.

Zemlin was a crucial contributor to the development of innovative laboratory space in the Speech and Hearing Science Building in the 1970s. It was a significant undertaking. His ability to make imaginative use of limited research equipment and simplify learning made him a valued teacher. In turn, Zemlin established lasting relationships with many SHS students as they radiated from campus to work as clinical practitioners, researchers and teachers.

“As a young professor with little money to cover the costs of having conference slides professionally prepared, Willard Zemlin taught me how to shoot and mount my own slides, using his mounted camera in the basement of the SHS Building, said Cynthia Johnson Parsons, an SHS associate professor emerita. “Bill also reminded our communication sciences and disorders field repeatedly that there was a great deal of normal variability in anatomical structures of the speech and hearing mechanism, which was never accounted for in CSD and medical textbooks. He was a strong advocate for observing and studying as many exemplars of an anatomical structure as you could find across people, in order to realize when a structure deviated substantially from normally functioning ones.”

In 1968, Zemlin wrote in the foreword to the first edition of his pioneering book, Speech and Hearing Science: Anatomy and Physiology: “Each of us who is concerned with the rehabilitation of speech, language and hearing should be able to visualize the anatomical structures involved, to understand their usual functions, and to hypothesize how they might function under adverse circumstances.”

The book utilized his laboratory photographs and displayed his skill in drawing diagrams, resulting in more than 400 images and illustrations. With this collection, Zemlin captured every bone, cartilage, muscle and tissue related to the speech and hearing mechanisms. At that time, David Kuehn, SHS professor emeritus, said the book was “clearly the best, [if not] the only, text that dealt specifically with anatomy and physiology of the speech and hearing mechanisms.” Kuehn considered it to be a magnificent text, praising it for its timeless content.

Zemlin’s textbook became the most widely and longest-used one in the field—his legacy, according to Kuehn. Current and former faculty members in SHS remember learning from it as students and later using it in classes they taught. Pamela Hadley, SHS professor and department head, said she “actually traced all those illustrations to make flashcards with the origin, insertion, fiber direction and function listed on the back.” Johnson Parsons said, “After I graduated from the University of Iowa, I continued to use the textbook and its illustrations when I taught phonetics and articulation/phonological disorders courses at the University of Minnesota, Northwestern University and the University of Illinois.” Kuehn used the textbook to teach the SHS course in the anatomy and physiology of the speech mechanism.

Later editions of Speech and Hearing Science included images of laryngeal behavior that Zemlin captured using an innovative photographic method he developed using a high-speed motion picture camera. Patricia Monoson from the University of Arkansas described it in the introduction to the fourth edition in 1998 as “the book you are about to read, learn, study and use as a reference for the rest of your professional life.”

Read more about Zemlin:

Zemlin bio from Illinois Distributed Museum

Shaping the teachings of speech, hearing anatomy for decades

Return to the SHS 50th main page

Tags: SHS at 50, Willard Zemlin

Department of Speech and Hearing Science rose from a humble start

March 09, 2023 | Bruce Adams

In 2023, SHS celebrated its 50th anniversary. The articles below highlight the key people and research that shaped SHS into the strong program it is today.

*Dr. Severina Nelson (left) was a pioneer in the field of speech therapy. (photo courtesy University of Illinois Archives)*

As humble beginnings go, it would be difficult to top that of the Department of Speech and Hearing Science at the University of Illinois.

In 1938, Dr. Severina E. Nelson repurposed a closet in Lincoln Hall to start an outreach program providing speech therapy. She began by assisting a student with some articulation difficulties. Sharing an office with colleagues and unable to find a private room, Nelson said, “Finally, the janitor volunteered to donate his mop closet so that I could set up a speech therapy lab. He moved to the basement.”

If that were all there was to it, Nelson would go down in campus history as one of the more determined, innovative, and resourceful professors at Illinois and as a founder of what, in 1973, became the Department of Speech and Hearing Science (SHS).

But there is more to Severina Nelson, and SHS, than that.

“Nowadays, our culture is notoriously rough on the dedicated person with a cause, especially a woman,” wrote a group of students to Nelson upon her retirement in 1964. “It is true that all new concepts only get recognition after someone has spent years being persistent and farsighted until finally, the disbelievers are made uncomfortable and become believers. You’ve been a woman with a gleam in your eye, and thank heaven, you never became a casualty of our system.”

Nelson earned her B.S. in 1918 and her M.A. in 1923 in English at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She began her professional life as a high school teacher in Iowa, coming back to Urbana-Champaign in 1920 as an associate instructor in the Division of Public Speaking in the Department of English. After earning her M.A. degree, she pursued a career teaching interpretive speech. She was an engaging speaker, giving countless readings for campus groups, on tours across Illinois, and on radio shows. This led to her co-authoring a best-selling speech textbook with Charles H. Woolbert in 1927: The Art of Interpretive Speech (with a fourth edition still in press in the 1960s).

In 1932, Nelson was elected president of Sigma Delta Phi, a national honorary women’s dramatic and speaking fraternity. Fittingly, it was Nelson who introduced aviator Amelia Earhart during her March 21, 1935 appearance on campus—two years before Earhart’s disappearance. Nelson had built a profile as a director of dramatic productions, including those for the Women’s League, the annual Homecoming “Stunt Show,” and the Hillel Players.

Nelson earned her Ph.D. in 1938 in Speech Pathology at the University of Wisconsin in Madison and then did post-doctoral work at the New York Medical College. The work Nelson began by helping college students with speech difficulties received funding and was then extended to community members. In 1938, she brought clinical practice at the University of Illinois into existence by establishing its speech clinic, serving as its director from 1939-59 and as a professor of speech from 1941-64. Some of Nelson’s early research in speech disorders focused on stuttering. She published three seminal articles from 1939-45 in the Quarterly Journal of Speech and The Journal of Pediatrics, on the role of heredity in stuttering, and in the Journal of Speech Disorders, on stuttering in twin types.

In 1939, the Daily Illini described Nelson as “one of the most popular instructors in summer school,” noting that “her office is different from the usual. Here you open the door and find yourself looking into a full-length mirror. Vanity isn’t the reason for the mirror’s being there. She finds it very useful in her speech correction work. Just during the past year, the speech department has made great advances in this work, and much of it has been under Miss Nelson’s supervision. Patients are studied and classified according to their type of speech defect, then they are turned over to students in speech correction classes for help.” (Please see Editor’s Note below regarding terminology use in historical records) Most of the student therapists were women whom Nelson supported as the faculty advisor to the campus chapter of Zeta Phi Eta, the national women’s speech sorority.

By 1940, Nelson had secured a $2,000 grant to support her clinic and extensive office and clinical space in Gregory Hall, where individuals with cerebral palsy, hearing disabilities, and cleft palate received therapy. She also had established an educational program in speech therapy at the University of Illinois, with four years of undergraduate coursework and one year of graduate study. From 1943-1944, as the chair of a state legislative committee, Nelson delivered 50 to 75 speeches throughout Illinois to win passage of the committee’s bill to provide supplemental funds for local clinical efforts. With the onset of the World War II, veterans were returning with “organic and psychological disabilities.” The clinic’s funding from the farsighted bills in the Illinois legislature was augmented by federal assistance to veterans. Twenty-seven nationwide colleges and universities received this funding, notably clustered in the Midwest around the University of Illinois, including Indiana University, Northwestern University, the University of Michigan, and several branches of what would become the University of Wisconsin system.

The demand for speech and hearing specialists was such that Nelson wrote to her department head in 1945 that the University of Illinois Speech and Hearing Clinic was competing against Army and Navy hospitals to recruit therapists for work in the Champaign and Urbana school districts. By 1946, there had been 16 master’s theses recorded in Speech and Hearing Science.

In 1950, under Nelson’s leadership and advocacy the clinic moved to the Lorado Taft House on campus (though, as she wrote in a letter, Nelson was convinced the University planned to demolish the building.) The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that “her enthusiasm, plus a brisk business-like air, are reflected in the rest of her efficient and enthusiastic staff.” A newsletter describing “Dr. Severina Nelson’s informative, vivid, and impressive account of the Illinois Speech Clinic” to the Urbana Rotary Club in January 1955 noted that “Professor Nelson filled her talk with case histories … all interesting. Urbana Rotary played a large part in sparking the state’s program—a program which for some years has been one of the best in the Union.”

When Nelson stepped down as director of the speech clinic in 1959, it had 10 full-time therapists. She resumed full-time teaching in speech pathology and oral interpretation, and by then, had advised more than 125 graduate theses. With her national renown, she was often requested as a speaker by groups and organizations across the country. After retiring in 1964, Nelson moved to Dallas and in 1978, received Honors of the Association from the Illinois Speech-Language-Hearing Association.

Contributor: Cynthia Johnson Parsons

Editor’s Note: As in many fields, perspectives and terminology in speech and hearing science (also called communication sciences and disorders) have evolved over the years, away from those appearing early in the historical record. For example, our focus has shifted away from correcting a person’s speech defects toward improving the intelligibility of their speech and enhancing the effectiveness of their communication with others.

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Tags: SHS at 50

CHAD symposium returns with thanks for pilot grants

March 03, 2023 | Vince Lara-Cinisomo

Pilot grants reignite Chad Symposium, fostering research collaboration and innovation

*KCH Associate Professor Naiman Khan’s presentation was titled “Role of Omega-3 Lipid Metabolites in Obesity and Cognitive Function” (Photo by Lisa Bralts)*

The first Center for Health, Aging, and Disability (CHAD) symposium since 2017 was a celebration of the research accomplished with the help of the Pilot Grant Program.

Three researchers from the College of Applied Health Sciences—Naiman Khan, an associate professor in Kinesiology and Community Health; Brian Monson, an assistant professor in Speech and Hearing Science, and Sharon Zou, an assistant professor in Recreation, Sport and Tourism, made a point of thanking CHAD’s grants for helping launch their studies.

Khan, whose presentation was titled “Role of Omega-3 Lipid Metabolites in Obesity and Cognitive Function,” said CHAD’s funding was vital to his work.

“CHAD was really helpful in us starting a new line of engagement of research,” he said.

CHAD director Jeff Woods, AHS’ associate dean for research, said to date, 38 pilot grants have been awarded since CHAD was launched in 2010, with $860,000 awarded to AHS researchers for pilot research. Woods described CHAD’s role as “work at the bookends of medicine … with the goal of improving people’s lives.”

“CHAD pilot grants are really important for junior faculty,” Zou said.

And the payoff has been well worth it, Woods said, citing the return on investment as approximately $16 in external funding to $1 in CHAD funding.

Zou’s presentation was titled “Exploring an Efficient and Equitable Entrance Fee for Public Lands: A Community-based investigation in the Indiana Dunes National Park.”

“I study how people have fun,” Zou said, explaining that it was vital for public parks and other tourism industries to build a sustainable revenue model and not to rely on decreasing funding from state and federal sources.

The primary purpose of Zou’s study was to “understand visitors’ and surrounding community residents’ perceptions of Indiana Dunes National Park user fees to inform a fee structure that balances revenue generation and equitable access.”

During and after the COVID-19 pandemic, Zou said, “parks saw explosions of people visiting.” While that was great for parks in terms of revenue, it also led to increasing operation costs at a time when government funding for these sites is being reduced.

“The specific goal is to find out how visitors see the park fees, and are they fair?,” Zou said.

The RST researcher said her preliminary findings indicate there was no consensus from study participants on what “fair” means, and that tension between fairness principles partly explains the longstanding controversy and debate on public land user fees.

Khan’s presentation focused on how poor lifestyle choices can predict an early onset of dementia, noting that obesity worldwide has increased threefold since the 1980s. The KCH researcher said his research, in conjunction with Aditi Das of Georgia Tech, suggested that the a deficiencyin the hormone dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA)—which has been reported to have beneficial effects on obesity, diabetes mellitus, and serum lipids in animals—was associated with individuals with a body-mass index (BMI) of 25 or higher, which is classified as obese.

“BMI is inversely connected to cognitive function,” Khan said. “Only in obese individuals do we see DHEA increase in circulation.” Khan said his preliminary results found:

Circulating Omega-3 metabolites were higher among persons with higher weight status and the levels were associated with degree of fat mass
Circulating metabolites inversely associated with cognitive function
Only observed among persons with overweight and obesity
Selectively associated with hippocampal function
Implications for memory function

Khan said his overarching goal was to “develop effective lifestyle approaches to improve cognitive function.”

SHS’ Monson discussed his study called “Capturing Prenatal Auditory Experience.”

“If there was a pregnant woman in this audience, that baby would be hearing my voice, and perhaps making judgments,” he said, drawing laughter from the gathering. “How do we know? Because full-term newborns come to the world with memories of what they’ve heard, including the mother’s voice.”

In utero, Monson explained, was a unique acoustic environment. When preterm infants are delivered, they are placed into incubators, which rapidly changed the sound profile, he said. The consequences of those changes include increased risk for sensorineural hearing loss, auditory neuropathy, language and speech developmental delays, auditory attention deficits and auditory processing disorder.

Monson’s study involved a group of pregnant women wearing a LENA listening device twice a week during the third trimester, while the device was placed into cribs of very preterm infants at Carle Foundation Hospital three times a week through their stay in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

“Fetuses are getting 2.5 hours a day of speech exposure vs. 32 minutes a day for very preterm infants,” he said. “It’s an alarming difference to me.”
NICU infants may incur a deficit of about 150 hours of speech exposure over the course of the preterm period, he explained.

One of the possible mitigation strategies for very preterm infants could be to provide meaningful targets (about three hours a day of speech exposure) to optimize auditory exposures in NICU settings.

“The maternal heartbeat is never turned off in utero,” he said. “The maternal heartbeat is never turned on in NICU.”

Following the CHAD Pilot Grant success stories, Wendy Rogers, the Shahid and Ann Carlson Khan Professor of Applied Health Sciences, talked about the work of Collaborations in Health, Aging, Research, & Technology (CHART).

CHART’s mission is to enable successful aging through:

Fundamental research
Advanced technology development
Education of researchers, developers, healthcare professionals, older adults
Guidance for policy decision-making
Translation of these efforts to positively affect the lives of older adults

CHART was the first research theme of the College of Applied Health Sciences and boasts the development of the McKechnie Family LIFE Home, an interdisciplinary research facility and simulated home environment that helps promote community engagement, industry partnerships, healthcare collaborations and faculty innovation.

Also part of the symposium was the introduction of a new AHS research theme called CARD (Collaborations in the Advancement of Research on Disability), led by KCH Associate Professor Laura Rice and KCH Professor John Kosciulek. CARD is focused on enhancing the health and quality of life of people with disabilities—through research that addresses critical gaps in disability-related knowledge and outreach that engages individuals with disabilities.

CARD’s short-term goals include:

Develop a collaborative working group
Develop communication strategies
Establish a steering committee of stakeholders
Develop and implement outreach and engagement events

Longer-term goals include:

Host a bi-annual research symposium
Develop a “toolkit” for UIUC faculty to support the performance of disability-related research in the Champaign-Urbana area
Respond to disability-related funding opportunities
Establish a competitive program to provide supplemental funding to support ongoing disability research among junior faculty
Host a seminar series with external experts
Establish a research training program for students registered with DRES interested in doing research
Support the development of new research registries and/or expansion of current registries

The first CARD meeting is set for March 22.

In kicking off the symposium, AHS Dean Cheryl Hanley-Maxwell said CHAD was “one of the biggest attractions” of her decision to come to Illinois and lead the college.

“When I thought about CHAD, I thought it’d be interesting to lead a college that has this kind of momentum to it, and I’ve been proven correct, year after year,” she said. “CHAD provides students with real-world engagement, and plays an absolutely critical role in their professional development.”

Woods agreed.

“We’re helping put the next generation of scientists into the field.”

Editor’s note:

To reach Vince Lara-Cinisomo, email vinlara@illinois.edu.

Tags: Brian Monson, CHAD, Chad Symposium, Jeff Woods, Naiman Khan, Sharon Zou, Wendy Bartlo

Boppart research to boost astronaut fitness on NASA’s mission to Mars

Dec. 15, 2022 | Jenna Kurtzweil

Harnessing the power of cells could be key to preserving astronauts’ fitness in low-gravity conditions.

From left, chemical and biomolecular engineering professor Hyun Joon Kong, kinesiology and community health professors Nicholas Burd and Marni Boppart, psychology professor Justin Rhodes, and chemistry professor Jonathan Sweedler are gathered at Freer Hall.

Exercise looks a little different en route to the Red Planet, so Professor Marni Boppart got creative.

Boppart and her colleagues at the Beckman Institute for Advanced Science and Technology received $1 million from the Translational Research Institute for Space Health, a NASA-funded institute, to explore the regenerative power of cells in space. Their research will help protect human health aboard Orion, the spacecraft destined to ferry astronauts from the Earth to the moon and Mars.

Because of the Earth’s mass, our daily movement is generally sufficient to keep our muscles in fine working order. Astronauts soaring through space are not afforded the luxury of gravitational pull.

“Astronauts can lose up to 20% of muscle mass after just two weeks, and 1-2% of bone mineral density every month. The longer the space travel, the greater the deterioration of tissues and physiological systems in the human body,” said Boppart, a professor of kinesiology and community health studying the science of exercise at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

Before joining the university, Boppart specialized in high-altitude health hazards as an officer and aerospace physiologist in the U.S. Air Force. Her current research in the College of Applied Health Sciences focuses on the molecular underpinning of muscle loss and gain. She hopes to develop cell-inspired strategies for recovering strength in circumstances — like spaceflight — when movement and mobility are limited.

When TRISH invited researchers to explore new ways to protect astronaut health and performance by enhancing the human body’s own maintenance and cellular repair abilities, Boppart seized the opportunity. Her project reimagines interstellar fitness with a cellular flair. The institute was scouting for strategies to protect astronaut health during long-duration space exploration missions, including NASA’s ongoing Artemis program, which will set up a sustainable presence on the Moon and prepare for future missions to Mars.

The Artemis program’s chosen vessel is the spacecraft Orion, which launched unmanned from the Kennedy Space Center in November. At the top of the vessel’s formidable to-do list is ferrying the first woman and first person of color from the Earth to the moon, followed closely by establishing humanity’s first long-term lunar presence and eventually trekking to the Red Planet.

Square footage is limited on Orion, which assumes the trifold identities of dormitory, dining hall, and control room all in one. The spacecraft is understandably bereft of the specialized resistance and endurance equipment that astronauts have access to on the International Space Station.

“But even the most intense [exercise] protocols performed in space are not sufficient to overcome the negative impacts of microgravity,” said Boppart. “Alternatives to traditional exercise, ideally based on exercise principles, are required.”

Astronauts are the target population for this funded study, but the result could potentially be used to prevent, maintain, or treat a variety of conditions associated with (muscle) inactivity and disuse, including aging, disability, or even disease, which would be exceptionally fulfilling.

Marni Boppart

Professor of Kinesiology and Community Health

With an approach fit for space travel, Boppart’s proposal turns our traditional understanding of exercise on its head — or rather, inside out. Instead of defining exercise by heavy footfalls or flailing limbs, she’s focusing squarely on the cellular relay underway within our muscles.

Honed by relentless evolution, our cells have yet to catch on to the concept of exercising for fun. When we lift heavy weights or engage in rigorous activities, our cells react with a well-intentioned stress response, deploying a battalion of chemicals into the bloodstream to boost our body’s ability to survive future threats. If a weight that once seemed too heavy becomes manageable with time and training, you have your overprotective, stressed-out cells to thank.

These chemical payloads don’t navigate the bloodstream’s harsh terrain on their own. Some are wrapped in a protective lipid layer called an extracellular vesicle, named for its pickup and delivery routes that transfer restorative chemicals from cell to cell.

Boppart believes that the extracellular vesicles our bodies generate after exercising, and the chemicals they contain, can trigger the restorative effects of exercise — even when no exercise has taken place.

“When we exercise, it’s not only our muscles that benefit, but all tissues, including the brain and skin. Our TRISH-sponsored work will directly test the ability of extracellular vesicles released after exercise to protect human health in space,” Boppart said.

The broad aim of Boppart’s study is to use extracellular vesicles generated naturally by volunteers on Earth, or even artificially, to replicate the restorative effect of exercise in astronauts, essentially enabling their muscles to engage in post-exercise recovery without ever having to lift a space-suited finger.

“Astronauts are the target population for this funded study, but the result could potentially be used to prevent, maintain, or treat a variety of conditions associated with inactivity and disuse, including aging, disability, or even disease, which would be exceptionally fulfilling,” Boppart said.

Her interdisciplinary collaborators at the Beckman Institute include: Justin Rhodes, a professor of psychology; Taher Saif, a professor of mechanical science and engineering; Jonathan Sweedler, a professor of chemistry; and Hyun Joon Kong, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering. UIUC professor of kinesiology and community health Nicholas Burd is also a co-investigator.

Research for the project titled “Design of an extracellular vesicle approach to protect human health in space” is expected to begin in October 2023. The $1 million award will be dispersed over two years. This study is funded by the Translational Research Institute for Space Health at Baylor College of Medicine. TRISH is funded by the NASA Human Research Program. The award was administered through the TRISH Biomedical Research Advances for Space Health solicitation.

Tags: Beckman Institute, Marni Boppart, NASA, Nick Burd

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