The World of Stuttering at your Fingertips: SLP Student Participation in the ISAD Online Conference

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Re: Question

From: Charlie Osborne
Date: 03 Oct 2007
Time: 09:17:53 -0500
Remote Name: 143.236.35.203

Comments

Good question! Personally, I feel that there is considerable value to learning where we have come from as a field and how the area of fluency has evolved over time. In an ideal world, I would prefer to have the luxury of including two fluency courses in the curriculum. Obviously, that would allow more information to be shared. Unfortunately, I must economize (and edit out a lot of interesting and illuminating information) because we only provide the one course at UWSP. One of my primary goals for the course is, that as a result of having attended, students will have the basic knowledge and skills necessary to perform at an entry-level in our profession. Along with that, I want each student to feel she or he can assess and treat a person with a stuttering problem (honestly, I want the student to WANT to assess and treat PWS and to get excited when they have the opportunity to do so!). I do not think I have addressed your question about a standard for universities. I think it would be a mistake to establish a standard that considers the exclusion of what I believe to be relevant and necessary information regarding stuttering. I would be concerned that with a focus exclusively on assessment & treatment that we as educators might be training clinicians as technicians and not as practicing professionals. Personally, I feel that I need to have an understanding of where we have been and where we are going as a profession in order to be effective clinically. Being an effective clinician requires much more than just knowing what to do. Knowing why you do what you do is, in my opinion, incredibly important. The ASHA DIV 4 has a document, Guidelines for practice in stuttering treatment, that is available on the ASHA website. This document provides what are considered the basic knowledge and skills required for working with PWS. It is in the early stages of being revised to reflect contemporary knowledge/information (it was published 11 years ago). If you take a look at it, you will notice that it includes that a clinician must have knowledge regarding the literature. I hope I’ve addressed your question. Thanks for your participation!


Last changed: 10/22/07