Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences
Bring your compassion and empathy to improve communication and lives
Study speech, language, and hearing, gain clinical skills, and bring your creativity and empathy to improving communication across the age span.
Gain the clinical and research skills to work with people from linguistically and culturally diverse populations across the age span. Help children with disabilities learn to communicate effectively. Help adults with hearing loss communicate effectively at home and at work. Help individuals with dementia and their families cope with debilitating illness. And fulfill your desire to make a profound difference in people’s lives.
At UMass, you’ll join a committed, compassionate community of faculty, staff, students, and alumni who, like you, strive to make a positive impact. Clinical graduate students have access to a variety of training opportunities through our on-campus clinic, the Center for Language, Speech, and Hearing.
Our degree programs offer superb value. Our students go on to work in education, healthcare, private practice, or in research, using advanced skills in areas like:
- American Sign Language
- Patient-Centered Care
- Hearing Technology
- Communication Strategies
- Implementation Science
Explore our programs
Undergraduate
Graduate
Certificate
Post-graduation employment rate
Job growth projections for speech language pathologists through 2031, much faster than average
Research Areas
Benefits list
Difference maker for children and adults.
Your graduate degree meets the requirements for national certification as a speech-language pathologist (CCC-SLP) or audiologist (CCC-A) and prepares you to help children with autism spectrum disorders, adults with Parkinson’s or stroke recovery, and people of all ages with hearing loss.
Cutting-edge research.
Take part in innovative transdisciplinary research working with faculty whose expertise ranges from aphasia and autism to hearing technology.
Fully accredited.
The MA in Speech-Language Pathology and Doctor of Audiology (AuD) programs are accredited by the Council on Academic Accreditation in Audiology and Speech-Language Pathology (CAA) of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA).
Alumni spotlight
In the Spotlight
“UMass Amherst is a great place to study audiology because the faculty are very supportive. Any kind of audiology, whether it be hearing aid work, cochlear implant work, or even vestibular work, there’s placement that the department can help facilitate.”
Community stories
Rebecca Candido
Featured Faculty
Nathaniel Whitmal, III
Focus on speech intelligibility; signal processing; hearing aids; cochlear implants; electroacoustics.
Michael Starr
Focus on adult neurogenic communication, gender affirming voice and communication.
Gwyneth Rost
Undergraduate Program Director, Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences
Focus on language development, developmental language disorders, word learning, lexical-semantic organization.
Jill Hoover
Graduate Program Director, Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences
Focus on phonological acquisition and disorders; grammatical acquisition and specific language impairment; language assessment and intervention in children.
Lisa Sommers
Clinical Director, Center for Language, Speech, and Hearing
Focus on speech-language pathology education; Parkinson's disease.
In the News
SPHHS Students Featured in Senior Spotlight Series
Thirteen graduating seniors representing the four SPHHS undergraduate majors are featured in the 2025 Senior Spotlight Series.
In the Media: News Roundup (May 28, 2025)
SPHHS researchers comment in multiple media outlets on health-related topics.
Kurland Developing AI Tool for Measuring Communication Ability in People with Language Impairments
Jacquie Kurland will use a three-year, $1.06 million funding award to develop and test an AI tool that measures communication success in people with aphasia.
Speech, Language, and Hearing Sciences
Preparing clinicians to work with individuals with communication disorders from linguistically and culturally diverse populations across the lifespan.