Dr. Christine Sapienza spent time with WJCT’s Melissa Ross this week discussing the importance of speech-language pathology as she starts up a new Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders at Jacksonville University.
Dr. Christine Sapienza
Sapienza, a national leader in the field, was chair for the past eight years of the University of Florida’s highly ranked department of Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences. She starts July 1 as associate dean of JU’s College of Health Sciences and will build the speech pathology programs.
“It’s an exploding field, and it’s exciting that students, whether incoming or transfers … can come to JU and become educated in a field where they can find employment,” said Sapienza, who added that speech pathology is a “top 20” career growth field.
Joining Sapienza on First Coast Connect on Monday, May 20, was Jodi Morgan, clinical research liaison and a speech-language pathologist at Brooks Rehabilitation, which is a partner with JU in the speech pathology programs.
Sapienza mentioned that people often underestimate the challenges raised by communication disorders, but that so much advancement has occurred in the field that people with such challenges now have many options for rehabilitation.
Show host Ross brought up that Duval County Schools Superintendent Nikolai Vitti recently opened up about this own dyslexia, and Sapienza noted that JU looks forward to working with the public schools to help in the training and education of clinicians and speech pathologists to help students.
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