After receiving her bachelor’s degree in Communication Sciences and Disorders at Baylor University, Kaley Birchfield entered Vanderbilt’s M.S. Speech Language Pathology (MS-SLP) Program as a part of the Early Identification and Management of Children with Hearing Loss Specialty Track. The track, led by Assistnat Professor of Hearing and Speech Science Dana Kan, PhD, is funded by a U.S. Department of Education training grant that focuses on preparing SLP students to work with infants and children who are deaf or hard of hearing. For Birchfield, who found her undergraduate audiology class fascinating, the hearing loss track at Vanderbilt was the perfect focus for her graduate school journey.
This initial interest didn’t stop there—now a student in Vanderbilt’s SLP program, Birchfield found the supplemental classes offered through the hearing loss track to be equally enamoring. From workshops where students practice troubleshooting hearing aids to courses specifically on teaching children with hearing loss, the curriculum covers a wide range of topics from aural rehabilitation to cochlear implants.
“We have some classes with Vanderbilt Audiology (AuD) students and Tennessee State University (TSU) SLP students,” Birchfield said. “The classes are taught by professors that have backgrounds as audiologists or teachers of the deaf, and learning from all of these different perspectives have been so valuable.”
As part of the hearing loss track, Birchfield had the opportunity to spend a semester with a clinical placement at Vanderbilt’s Mama Lere Childhood Hearing School, a program that teaches children ages two to four with hearing loss to listen, talk, sing, and read. MLHS provides audiological and speech-language services, as well as educational evaluation and individualized educational plans. During her first semester at MLHS, she worked with children with hearing loss who utilized hearing technology. Additionally, Birchfield will have opportunities in settings beyond Vanderbilt—as part of her Maymester placement, she will undergo a full-time, three-week clinical practicum at the Auditory Verbal Center in Atlanta that specializes in Auditory Verbal Therapy (AVT).
“All the kids that I worked with on the caseload either had hearing aids or cochlear implants, and that was such a special opportunity to work with this population,” she said. “A big approach for this population, if they are pursuing spoken language, is Auditory Verbal Therapy (AVT), and I was very grateful to get that experience right off the bat.”
Students in the hearing loss track fulfill 100 volunteer hours related to hearing loss during the first year of the SLP program. During her first semester, Birchfield tutored a fourth-grade student with cochlear implants in different academic subjects such as math and reading comprehension. Currently, Birchfield is volunteering at Dr. Jena McDaniel’s Child Language Intervention, Measurement, and Best practices (CLIMB) lab, which focuses on improving the efficiency of language intervention for children who are deaf and hard of hearing.
“While tutoring, it was really neat to get the perspective of how students are doing after they’ve gone through the rehabilitation process,” she said. “And on the other side of things, in lab, it’s been interesting to study language outcomes for children who are deaf and hard of hearing.”
“There’s so much that we’re still learning about outcomes and effective interventions, and I love how this track is a blend of science and therapy,” Birchfield said.
In the future, Birchfield sees herself pursuing certification for Auditory Verbal Therapy (AVT) and wants to apply interdisciplinary SLP approaches to her care for deaf and hard of hearing patient populations.
“I’m always going to prioritize family-centered care and collaborating with other professionals,” Birchfield said. “It’s important to me to bring lots of disciplines together to give the patient or student the best outcomes possible.”
Learn more about Hearing and Speech Sciences programs at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine on our website.