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 two current students in the work-study program.
To start us off, the students introduced themselves and stated their undergraduate program:
Dariannn Pastelok:
I'm Dariannn, I'm from the class of 2021. I am from Clearfield, Pennsylvania, and I went to Bloomsburg University for my bachelor's degree in communication sciences and disorders.
Hannah Weidman:
My name is Hannah, I am from the class of 2022 and I am from Lancaster, Pennsylvania. And I got my BS from Kent State University and my degree was in speech-language pathology and audiology.
Bob Serianni:
Tell us one reason why you chose coming to Salus.
Hannah Weidman:
In my process of the fun application to grad school, Salus really stood out to me for its early clinical exposure and really just how the Speech-Language Institute on campus is run as a whole. I know I was super intimidated, starting out with clients my very first semester, right when I got there. But I have learned more than I ever could have imagined at this point and the experience is just so incredible.
I've really appreciated, for each of my clients, you're paired with a clinical educator who has a whole wealth of knowledge and experience, specific for your client's diagnosis or whatever it is that they have. So that's been really, really awesome. Yeah, the clinical exposure is definitely what stood out to me the most.
Dariannn Pastelok:
Yeah, definitely going along with that, the variety of experiences Salus offers, definitely stood out to me. With the Speech-Language Institute right on campus, along with the different preschools that you can go to and the different TBI groups that we can get assigned to go to. I did the Breastfeeding Resource Center, so it was a little bit different with COVID, but it was great experience. And along with the clinical educators, just the variety - you don't just have one, you have multiple, that have many skills and different backgrounds and experiences.
Bob Serianni:
It's funny you both bring up, your clinical time in the Speech-Language Institute, our on-campus clinic, because I believe that's where you both have done your work-study work. So tell me a little bit about what your job duties have been in the clinic and how does that preparation differ from what you do on the treatment side? You're really seeing the administrative side. How do you think that's going to help you prepare for your career?
Dariannn Pastelok:
I did a little bit of everything in the clinic. I updated patients’ charts regularly. I organized and cleaned the toys and went through the materials, organizing all of that. What else did I do? Go through the testing closet and made sure there were updated tests and all the protocols were there. Along with, I did answer the phone and interact with clients, checking them in and everything like that.
Definitely time management, it's improved my time management because I was in there constantly. So just working around that, along with becoming familiar with materials and different testing protocols, has really just expanded my knowledge. Even now, being in a hospital, my supervisor and I go, "Oh, what test would you do for this? Or what would you do for this?" Even though I've never given it, I have more of a familiar idea of what it would be.
Hannah Weidman:
Even just working so far for one and a little bit semesters here, it's been a really great experience, both with learning the administrative stuff and also getting to interact a little bit with clients and clinical educators and other students, in ways that I wouldn't if I wasn't in this position.
And I know as an SLP, depending on the field that you're working in specifically, you do have to do things like phone calls, speaking to clients, doing their intakes, getting them ready for evaluations and that's all stuff that I do there. And definitely agree with the time management skills, along with organization, both physically in those toy closets and the protocols and looking at all of that. And communication skills have definitely been strengthened through this, as well.
Bob Serianni:
So now that you've been involved in the program, what would you tell a student applying to Salus or really any other program? What would you tell them to think about, before they apply to a program?
Hannah Weidman:
So I would just say, very basic advice is to be confident in the skills that you have and all of the knowledge that you've gained up until this point. And really, just get excited about the future and the possibilities that lie there, and be confident in yourself and know that you're going to learn so much and you're going to end up wherever meant to be. But be confident because you probably have all the skills that you need.
Dariannn Pastelok:
I know coming into grad school, not just me, but a lot of people are like, "Oh yeah, I'm working with this population. I'm working in this setting." You never know what's going to happen. So just be willing to learn new things, to experience new things.
