This roundtable is part of an ongoing podcast series about the Speech-Language Pathology program at Salus University.
Thanks for joining us for our podcast series, talking about speech-language pathology graduate school. Join Robert Serianni, MS, CCC-SLP, FNAP, the chair and program director of the department of Speech-Language Pathology at Salus University as he speaks with recent alumni from the program. Learn more about what it's like to work at a practice after the days of being in graduate school.
To start us off, the alumni introduced themselves and stated when they graduated from the program as well as a favorite memory of their time at Salus:
Carleen Dumas
I'm Carleen, I graduated 2018, which seems like forever ago. I'm currently working at My Child's Therapy, which I'm also one of the owners there. And I guess there's a lot of fond memories at Salus, but one of the ones that stands out was probably attending the ASHA seminar, especially because it was local in Philly that year. And I also had the opportunity to volunteer there, which was really cool. And it was just a really cool submersion of the whole field and all the clinical presentations and everything. It was pretty awesome.
Paige Maino
Hi, I'm Paige. I just graduated in 2020 in the middle of a pandemic, so that was really fun. I work now at My Child's Therapy with Kristin and Carleen. And my favorite memory was also attending ASHA, but I got to go when it was in Orlando, which was awesome because we got to escape the cold weather. Some of my friends were presenting, which was really cool to see them present their capstones. And especially being there as a student, kind of trying to figure out where I wanted to go post-grad and attending seminars and things like that. That was really interesting.
Kristin Fitzgerald
My name's Kristin, and I also graduated in 2020 in the midst of the pandemic, and I'm working at My Child's Therapy as well, with Paige and Carleen. And it's been an awesome experience here. My favorite memory from Salus, I think, was presenting our capstone projects. Paige and I were actually in the same group and we presented to a group of undergrad students at Arcadia University about how they can use everyday games in their classroom to enhance executive functioning skills in kids. And it's actually been something that I've been able to use here at My Child's Therapy as well with some of my older kiddos who are working on some executive functioning skills.
Bob Serianni
Thank you so much. I'm glad that you were able to sort of remember a fun time, because I know graduate school can be challenging with the tests and the projects and the clinic. I'm guessing you remember all those times as well, as I see your wary faces. So now that you've sort of completed the program, can you think back to before even the program started and think about one reason why you chose to go to graduate school at Salus?
Kristin Fitzgerald
The biggest thing that I liked during the whole application process, I guess, was that Salus was the only school that offered me an interview. And I loved the fact that I got to go to Salus, meet some different faculty members, some of the clinical supervisors, get a feel for the campus, and really be able to visualize myself there. Whereas, many of the other schools didn't offer me that. So it was kind of just this unrealistic image of myself. Whereas at Salus, it felt like I fit in. I could see myself there and got to know a little bit more about the campus before actually starting.
Paige Maino
So I loved the fact that Salus was in such close proximity to Philadelphia. I see myself living here for a long time, so I loved that, through Salus, we were able to get clinical experiences and opportunities to be at well-known facilities in the city and get to make connections with well-known clinicians in the area. So I really loved the fact that Salus offered those opportunities, and that was one of the big things that really drew me there.
Carleen Dumas
I think one of the big appeals and really cool things was that it was a brand new program. We were only the second class. You guys were still in the accreditation process. So being part of that was pretty awesome. And it almost made us feel more valuable, I guess. And yeah, it was just an exciting time for the program. It was brand new.
Bob Serianni
I don't know if there's a time where we can stop saying that we're brand new. We're trying to keep everything all nice and shiny, but now that we're looking to accept, believe it or not, our sixth class in the fall, I think it's time to say that we're not new any longer.
So hopefully our listeners have gathered that the three of you work for Carleen's practice, My Child's Therapy. So I'm going to ask Paige and Kristin to forget that Carleen's on this call with us right now and talk about some of the things that you have enjoyed as you began your careers. Obviously both of you found something that you would really like to do with the private practice, but what are you applying that you've learned, or what kind of things have you drawn from your graduate program to your real life experiences now?
Paige Maino
So the cool thing that I guess Salus had to offer was the interdisciplinary experiences with the other programs. And here at My Child's Therapy, we work frequently with other professionals. I work with occupational therapists, I would say three or four times a day, at least. So it's been nice that those experiences at Salus have kind of taught me how to establish, prioritize, and work together as a team to formulate treatment goals and work together for the betterment of our clients.
Kristin Fitzgerald
I definitely have to agree with that too. I actually just got done working with an occupational therapist in my last session, and I had a feeding client at the Salus clinic, and I had never had any type of experience with that before, was kind of completely in the dark about how to even go about it, because it was such a unique experience. But I now have a couple of feeding kids at My Child's Therapy, and that was the child I just had. And I actually have some oatmeal still stained on my shirt. But I've been using some of the techniques that my clinical supervisor taught me, and have carried them over here. And I love working with the occupational therapist and learning from her, and she learns from me and we bounce off of each other. So that's been a really unique experience and one that I've combined with my education from here, as well as my Salus experience.
Bob Serianni
So we're going to switch gears and look to Carleen. You're a business owner now. That's pretty incredible, especially in such a short turnaround from your graduate school experience to now. What's it like to own your own business? And maybe we'll pretend Kristin and Paige aren't on the line and we'll say, what's it like to employ Salus graduates?
Carleen Dumas
No, really, it's awesome. It's surreal. It's stressful. But mostly awesome. I love the outpatient setting. I think you just have a little bit more flexibility and ability to use your real clinical skills. The standards aren't as narrow for making recommendations and qualifying kids. It's just not as narrow as somewhere like a school. And just following the plan of care and writing goals. I feel like we just have so much more flexibility with that. And especially also being one of the business owners, I love getting feedback from the therapists. I mean, they're seeing more kids than me and I'm very open to any feedback that they have. And yeah, I think the biggest thing is I just really like the setting, the outpatient setting, and being able to feel like we're really using our skills and not just following guidelines.
We get so much praise from families and everything, and it makes me feel really proud. I'm really happy with our team. I feel like we're really lucky with the therapists that we have.
Bob Serianni
I'm proud, too. It's really nice to see your students sort of grow up and move on. It's a very parental feeling, but I think it is a sense of pride that you've given experiences, opportunities, and the three of you have really taken advantage of that. And I'm so glad, even though you're not from the same generation of speech pathologists here, that you've all found each other on the outside and get to work together.
Going back to all three of you, thinking about your time since you've left the program, again, some closer than others, and certainly leaving during a pandemic might have changed some of your experiences, but have you had any surprises since leaving graduate school? Are there things that you know now that you wish you knew then that might have changed either the things that you did in the program or things you did right after you graduated? So what surprises laid out there for you after graduation?
Kristin Fitzgerald
I am just kind of realizing how much there still is to learn. Grad school can never ... I mean, obviously, I learned so, so much, but you just can never learn it all really until you get completely hands-on and that's when you really start to learn all the different types of techniques and treatments and diagnoses and all that type of thing. And even just Carleen has been teaching me some myofunctional training, which I didn't even really know existed. I mean, I always knew about tongue ties and things like that, but I'm going through this whole training now and it's awesome.
And so I'm just realizing there's so much more to continue exploring after grad school. And I've also learned that it's okay to not have all the answers because you're always going to be growing and always going to be learning. And so, no matter how many years of experience, you might not have the answer and sometimes that's okay and you just kind of have to figure it out and work with it.
Carleen Dumas
I'm sure that the girls can relate to this, being surprised about how quickly you become independent, because I think it's really scary when you're initially leaving school and you're like, "What am I going to do? I need a supervisor. They need to be at the setting." And then you realize you're the therapist and you're able to be independent, you're way more prepared than you realize.
And I agree about, there's just always more to learn. And the more you learn, the more you realize you don't know, which is kind of cool, because it's like endless knowledge in areas that you can learn about and specialize in and things like that. And I guess she was talking about the myotherapy and things like that, like learning about these specialized training. I wonder, if I had known about all this in school, would I have had other questions to ask the professionals and things like that? But yeah, there's just so much to learn. You can't know everything.
Paige Maino
I have so many questions on a daily basis, things that I never even would have thought I would have questions about before. But like Carleen said, I definitely think the thing that surprised me the most was the fact that now I was the person that people were looking to for answers. And before, I was always the student and would kind of turn to my supervisor and be like, "So you going to answer that?" And now it's like, "Oh, that's me," you know? And I feel supported here, but I am the person that they're looking to for advice and things like that. So I definitely think that was the biggest learning curve, was, "It's on me now."
But I also think that's kind of allowed me to explore different areas of just the pediatric therapy world and maybe where I want to go with doing more trainings and becoming specialized in areas. So it's been fun.
Bob Serianni
Well, I can say, as a senior SLP, there are still days where I go, "Huh. I wonder what we should do here." So I'd have to agree with all three of you that the learning never ends. And I'm happy for this profession because we always have something new to learn.
So I've been asking our participants here to sort of wrap us up on our talks to leave prospective students with an idea or a thought. What would be one suggestion you would make to them as they apply for a program? What's sort of your nugget of wisdom you want to leave prospective students with?
Carleen Dumas
I guess the biggest thing is just to take advantage of the time that you have as a student and this learning opportunity and just having access to all of these skilled professionals with years of experience, you know, the ones that were coming and teaching our classes and everything, just to ask lots of questions and take it all in, take advantage of it.
Kristin Fitzgerald
I would definitely say to, whatever grad school you end up in, definitely try to see and do as much as you possibly can. I know you guys always told us at Salus like, "You might come in thinking, 'I want to work with kids. I want to work with kids. I want to work with kids', and then you work with one kid and you're like, 'Wait, no, I don't.' And with the flip of a switch, you can totally change what you think your whole life is planned out to be." So I would say, keep every door open, keep an open mind and try to do all different types of things so that you can really see what you like, what you don't like, and what's the best fit for you.
Paige Maino
I would also say, especially at Salus, they provided us with all the different support groups and things like that. And I never would have saw myself working, for example, with total laryngectomy, but they had the opportunity to do this total laryngectomy support group, and I love that I've had that experience. And even though I'm working in the paeds world right now, I still think it's awesome that you could take advantage of things like that and just grow your skillset, even if you're not doing that on a daily basis. So yeah, to sum it up, like everyone else said, really just take advantage of everything that the school has to offer.
Bob Serianni
Well, I really have to say that I'm so glad that you were able to gather with me today. I hope our listeners hear that you not only have survived graduate school, but you're really thriving post-graduate school. I think you're all excellent examples of the kind of students that we do hope to graduate, that are taking advantage of their education, and then when they move into the profession, giving back to the profession, and really working with clients and families in a meaningful way.
Carleen Dumas
I just wanted to add, because I know you kind of asked specifically about Salus students, but I was checking in with my CF supervisor and I was telling her, I'm like, "I feel like I have it really easy. These CFs are pretty awesome. I feel like I didn't have to do anything. They knew what to do." And she agreed that Salus sends really good students, students and graduates. She was saying that. She's like, "They always are great."
Bob Serianni
That's great to know because that's what we're really trying to do. We're trying to give the community speech pathologists that are valuable to the profession, to the agencies that they work for. And I'm so proud of the three of you, and I trust that My Child's Therapy will just continue to grow.
