Department of Communicative Disorders and Deaf Studies
M.A. in Communicative Disorders
Options: Education of the Deaf, Speech-Language PathologyDr. Donald Freed, Department Chair
Dr. Steven Skelton, Graduate Program Coordinator
- Program Objectives | Program Strengths | Graduates in Demand | Profile of Our Student Population | Faculty | Quick Facts
Program Objectives
Approximately 15% of adults and children in the general population experience some form of a speech, language, or hearing impairment, or a combination of these. Through the on-campus Speech and Hearing Clinic, the Department of Communicative Disorders and Deaf Studies at California State University, Fresno provides necessary services to students, staff, faculty, and community residents with communicative disorders, while preparing our students to become professionals who provide services throughout the region and state. With such services, we improve individuals' communication, social development, academic performance and potential, and emotional adjustment to life. We do this while helping them develop the communicative skills necessary to enhance their employability.
In California and beyond, our department is actively involved in the dissemination of knowledge within the field. We seek to provide students with the most advanced levels of knowledge and technology available while they gain community service experience, administering much-needed aid to communicatively handicapped individuals both on campus and throughout the region.
To provide a venue for student involvement within the community, our university has developed close partnerships with 51 different school districts, hospitals, public and private clinics, physicians' offices, Headstart programs, and other agencies. Statewide partnerships include such agencies as the California Schools for the Deaf (in Fremont and Riverside), several Veterans' Administration hospitals, and a number of school districts.
Program Strengths
A unique feature of the program is the university's Speech and Hearing Clinic, operated by the department. Through the clinic and various internship programs, the department's student clinicians, interns, student teachers, and staff provide more than 40,000 client contacts per year. This includes speech and hearing testing as well as therapy services. Our students and faculty also provide testing and referral services at the on-campus children's center, at health fairs in the community, and various. The majority of these clients would not be able to afford services otherwise.
Another strength of the program is the integration of clinical practicum with diverse academic coursework options. There are two professional areas available to the student. Our Deaf Education program provides a broad background in bilingual-bicultural education, total communication, and cued speech philosophies along with speech, language, auditory training, deaf culture, and American Sign Language. The program in Speech-Language Pathology gives a professional background in normal speech and language development, and language, voice, articulation, and fluency disorders.
Students in Speech-Language Pathology have their first contact with practicum in their first graduate semester. Each subsequent semester, students are involved in on-campus practicum or off-campus internships and student teaching assignments while taking courses toward completion of their master's degree. Deaf Education students begin working with deaf children a minimum of one hour per week as seniors, and complete a student teaching assignment with deaf and hard-of-hearing children.
Graduates in Demand
Virtually all graduates are hired upon graduation, and in most cases, several job offers are presented. This is due to regional, statewide, and national shortages for professionals in communicative disorders. This trend is expected to continue for many years. For example, approximately 15% of all communicative disorders and deaf studies positions in California are unfilled. This rate has persisted for at least the last decade.
Many of our graduates move immediately into administrative or leadership positions in school districts, professional organizations, and other service areas at state and national levels. Graduates of our program hold positions as directors, and managers and coordinators in regional hospitals, private practices, clinics, and public school programs.
Profile of Our Student Population
The student organizations, the local chapter of the National Student Speech-Language-Hearing Association (NSSLHA) and the newly formed American Sign Language Club (ASL Club), have been active on our campus. Both have co-sponsored many on-campus workshops and conferences. The student organizations have sponsored many workshops and conferences by statewide and nationally known authorities in a variety of areas.
Students' co-authorship with faculty of books and clinical materials and their presentations of papers at state and national conventions, reflect the nationally recognized level of our work. Our students work hard, and it pays off. In the last five years an estimated 150 students have won major competitive scholarships, from such sources as American Association of University Women, ASHA Foundation, CALED Foundation, California SLHA, Optimists, Emblem Club Foundation, POE International Peace, Pre-Doctoral Fellowships, and the Rodman Fellowships. The department attracts a number of out-of-state transfer students from universities such as Arizona, Augustana, Gallaudet, Iowa, Massachusetts, Washington, and Wichita State. International students have come to us recently from Argentina, Brazil, Germany, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Malaysia, Norway, Singapore, Sweden, Taiwan, and Zimbabwe. At California State University, Fresno, we consider the diversity and dedication of our students an important part of one of the finest programs in Communicative Disorders and Deaf Studies in our nation.
Program Objectives | Program Strengths | Graduates in Demand | Profile of Our Student Population | Faculty | Quick Facts