University of Massachusetts Amherst

Department of Communication Disorders

Faculty

Mary V. Andrianopoulos

Associate Professor
Telephone: 413-545-0551
Email:
mva@comdis.umass.edu
Web: http://www-unix.oit.umass.edu/~mva/
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #305B

B.S., University of Vermont, 1979; M.S., University of Utah, 1983, Ph.D., 1988; CCC-SLP.

Clinical voice disorders, motor speech disorders, neurological bases of speech and language disorders, and differential diagnosis of speech and language disorders.

Jane A. Baran

Professor
Chair of the Department of Communication Disorders
Telephone: 413-545-0565
Email: baran@comdis.umass.edu
Web: http://www-unix.oit.umass.edu/~baran/
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #201E

B.A., University of Massachusetts Amherst, 1972, M.A., 1974; Ph.D., Purdue University, 1979; ASHA Fellow, CCC-A/SLP.

Electrophysiological testing, anatomy and physiology of the peripheral and central auditory systems, central auditory processing, and speech and language characteristics in individuals with hearing impairments.

Richard L. Freyman

Professor                                                                             Undergraduate Program Director
Telephone: 413-545-0298
Email: rlf@comdis.umass.edu
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #201A

B.S., Pennsylvania State University, 1976; M.A., Temple University, 1978; Ph.D., University of Minnesota, 1984; CCC-A.

Binaural and spatial hearing in anechoic and reverberent environments, and improving speech understanding in competing noise.

Karen S. Helfer

Associate Professor
Graduate Program Director
Telephone: 413-545-4014
Email: khelfer@comdis.umass.edu
Web: http://www-unix.oit.umass.edu/~helfer/
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #201B

B.S., Boston University, 1982; M.A., Indiana University, 1983; Ph.D., Northwestern University, 1988; CCC-A.

Geriatric changes in auditory processing, psychoacoustics, and effects of noise and reverberation on speech perception.

 

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Jacquie Kurland

Assistant Professor
Telephone: 413-545-4007
Email: jkurland@comdis.umass.edu
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #307A

B.A., New Mexico State Univeristy, 1987; M.S., University of New Mexico, 1999; Ph.D., Univeristy of Colorado at Boulder. 2006; CCC-SLP.

Cognitive and neurological bases of normal and disordered speech and language; neural mechanisms supporting language recovery in chronic aphasia.

Patricia A. Mercaitis

Associate Professor
Telephone: 413-545-2007
Email: mercaitis@comdis.umass.edu
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #304

B.A., Boston College, 1971; M.A., University of Massachusetts Amherst, 1979, Ph.D., 1983; CCC-SLP.

The clinical supervision process, clinical skill development, counseling in communication disorders, and fluency disorders.

Sarah F. Poissant

Associate Professor
Telephone: 413-545-4016
Email: spoissant@comdis.umass.edu
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #308B

B.A., University of Vermont, 1992; M.A., University of Connecticut, 1994, Ph.D., 1999; CCC-A.

Early identification of hearing loss, pediatric rehabilitative audiology, maximizing auditory speech perception in children with hearing loss, and cochlear implants.

Charlena M. Seymour

Professor
Senior Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs and Provost
Telephone: 413-545-2554
Email: c.seymour@provost.umass.edu
Campus Address: 371 Whitmore

B.F.A., Howard University, 1965; M.A., Ohio State University, 1967, Ph.D., 1971; ASHA Fellow, CCC-SLP.

Speech and language problems in school-aged children, fluency disorders, and multicultural issues.

Shelley L. Velleman

Associate Professor
Telephone: 413-545-3636
Email: velleman@comdis.umass.edu
Web: http://www-unix.oit.umass.edu/~velleman/
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #307B

B.A.,Wellesley College, 1976; M.A., Wisconsin at Madison, 1978, University of Massachusetts Amherst, 1985; Ph.D., University of Texas at Austin, 1983; CCC-SLP.

Phonological development and disorders.

Nathaniel Anthony Whitmal III

Assistant Professor
Telephone: 413-545-4848
Email: nwhitmal@comdis.umass.edu
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #305A

B.S., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 1986; M.S., Northwestern University, 1993, Ph.D., 1997; M.A. University of Massachusetts Amherst, 2004.

Speech intelligibility, signal processing for hearing aids and cochlear implants, and electroacoustics.

Elena Zaretsky

Assistant Professor
Telephone: 413-545-3177
Email: ezaretsky@comdis.umass.edu
Campus Address: 358 North Pleasant St., #308

B.A., Music Institute, Moscow, 1989; M.S., MGH Institute of Health Professions, 1994; Ph.D., Boston University, 2004.

Typical and atypical language acquisition, verbal working memory and language comprehension, development of sound segmentation skills, and bilingual issues in language processing and use.

Adjunct Faculty / Emeritus Faculty

  • Uma Balakrishnan, Assistant Professor
  • Rae Banigan, Assistant Professor
  • Peter Bittel, Assistant Professor
  • Myrna Cronen, Assistant Professor
  • G. Albyn Davis, Professor Emeritus
  • Harry Seymour, Professor Emeritus
http://www.umass.edu/sphhs/comdis/