Lauren Calandruccio, associate professor of psychology and the Louis D. Beaumont University Professor II at Case Western Reserve University, was featured as part of the cover story in the latest publication of The Hearing Journal. In collaboration with Hampton University, a historically black college and university, Calandruccio worked with Jessica Sullivan, interim department chair in the department of communicative sciences and disorders at Hampton University, to form IMPACT, a year-long mentoring program for underrepresented students in speech-language pathology and audiology. In the article, Calandruccio and Sullivan discuss the vision for and creation of Innovative Mentoring and Professional Advancement through Cultural Training, or IMPACT.
Founded in the spring of 2020, Sullivan and Calandruccio submitted a proposal for the creation of IMPACT to the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA). The two audiologists were inspired to develop IMPACT as a result of implicit discriminatory practices within the field of audiology and the underrepresentation of minority individuals in the practice. Through IMPACT, aspiring audiology and speech-language pathology students can be better equipped to continue their education.
Read the article on The Hearing Journal’s website.