Faculty and Staff
Our philosophy is to facilitate open communication between students and faculty via an open-door policy which allows students to discuss any academic, clinical, or personal topics as needed. We strive to provide a welcoming atmosphere that nurtures students in a way that will foster professional and interpersonal growth in their journeys to become professionals in the field of communication disorders.
Donna Scarborough, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, BCS-S
Interim Department Chair, Professor
Dr. Scarborough is a speech-language pathologist and Professor in th eDepartment pf Speech Pathology and Audiology. She has taught a number of different classes at both the undergraduate and graduate levels over the past nineteen years. Her research interests include developmental neurosensory physiology, dysphagia, transitional feeding, and medical pediatrics. Dr. Scarborough has engaged in cross-disciplinary activities with Manufacturing and Mechanical Engineering, Neuroscience, Statistics, and Farmer School of Business at Miami University. In conjunction with Dr. Bailey-Van Kuren (of Engineering) holds 2 patents. Dr. Scarborough is also a Board Certified Specialist in Swallowing (BCS-S) and regularly treats pediatric patients in the Speech and Hearing Clinic. Dr. Scarborough was the Director of Graduate Studies August 2013-July 2022. She has also held national board positions in the Dysphagia Research Society, American Speech-Language Hearing Association Special Interest Group (SIG) 13-Swallowing and Swallowing Disorders, and the American Board of Swallowing and Swallowing Disorders.
Arnold Olszewski, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Graduate Director, Associate Professor (7.1.23)
Dr. Olszewski is a speech-language pathologist with previous experience working in schools. His research focuses on developing feasible, evidence-based language and literacy interventions for young children. Specifically, he has contributed to the development and evaluation of interventions for phonological awareness, alphabet knowledge, vocabulary, and syntax. Dr. Olszewski is the director of the Children’s Acquisition of Language and Literacy (CALL) Lab at Miami University.
Cheryl Stewart, M.A., CCC-SLP
Clinic Coordinator
Mrs. Stewart is a speech-language pathologist who has worked in a variety of settings as a clinician, supervisor, team coordinator, consultant and independent contractor. She specializes in infants and toddlers.
Faculty
Susan Baker Brehm, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Associate Dean, College of Arts and Sciences; Professor
Dr. Baker Brehm is a speech-language pathologist whose interests include the evaluation and treatment of voice disorders. She has a clinical and research affiliation with the Center for Pediatric Voice Disorders at the Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. Her research also focuses on the use of respiratory training to reduce breathlessness during speech and exercise in patients with upper airway disorders.
Katherine (Katie) Baker, M.A., CCC-SLP
Visiting Instructor
Katie Baker has been a full-time Speech-Language Pathologist for the past 14 years at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center. Serving infants-adults through the Outpatient Neurorehabilitation Team (ONRT), Katie has provided inpatient and outpatient rehabilitation services for speech, language, and neurocognitive disorders as well as dysphagia. Katie has been a Certified Brain Injury Specialist since 2010 and became a Point of Care Scholar in 2011. She has previously taught the graduate level Evidence-Based Practice course at Miami University in 2016 and has worked collaboratively with faculty and graduate students for the past 10 years on evidence-based practice projects.
Tammy Brown, M.A, CCC-A, ABA-FAAA
Clinical Instructor
Ms. Brown is a clinical audiologist who provides services in the Miami University Speech and Hearing Clinic. She has worked and trained in hospital, school, and private ENT clinic settings. Her interests are evaluation and treatment of all ages, etiology of hearing loss, consumer-based care models, interdisciplinary collaborative program development, and student engagement and supervision. She has presented on topics of ethics, genetics of hearing loss, hearing aid fitting rationale, and other audiology topics. Ms. Brown has also served numerous leadership roles including President elect of the National Council for State Boards, President of the Licensure Board and Audiology member, and an Audiology position on the Ohio Board of Speech Pathology and Audiology.
Sarah Ellis, M.Ed., CCC-SLP
Visiting Faculty
Sarah Ellis is a Speech-Language Pathologist with experience in an adult rehabilitation setting treating patients after brain injury and stroke. She also has experience in LTAC, skilled nursing, home health, and outpatient settings. Sarah has been a Certified Brain Injury Specialist since 2016. Sarah received her undergraduate degree from James Madison University and master’s degree from the University of Virginia.
Amber Franklin, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Associate Professor
Dr. Franklin is a speech-language pathologist whose research interests include cross-linguistic and child phonology, cultural and linguistic diversity in CSD, and scholarship of teaching and learning. Her focus is on the appropriate identification of speech sound disorders within dialectal variation. She is currently investigating linguistic variation on the Eastern Caribbean island of Anguilla, where local residents speak English and Anguillian English Creole. Dr. Franklin is the director of the Language Learning Pronunciation and Perception Lab (L2P2). She is a member of the National Black Association for Speech-Language and Hearing, the Society for Caribbean Linguistics, and the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association’s SIG 14 on Cultural and Linguistic Diversity. In 2017, Dr. Franklin was named Miami University’s ASG Outstanding Professor of the Year.
Renee Gottliebson, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Associate Clinical Professor
Dr. Gottliebson is a speech-language pathologist whose interests include the evaluation and treatment of voice disorders, particularly the care and training of the professional voice. Additionally, Dr. Gottliebson specializes in adult spoken communication enhancement and spoken English enhancement. Dr. Gottliebson serves as Externship Coordinator for the graduate program.
Megan Gross, M.S., NIC
Associate Clinical Faculty
Mrs. Gross serves as the Program Coordinator for the American Sign Language courses. She teaches the intermediate American Sign Language courses as well as the Global Perspectives on Deaf Culture and ASL Service Learning courses. She is a nationally certified interpreter and has worked in the education, medical, legal, and video relay service industries.
Chip Hahn, M.S., Au.D., CCC-A/SLP
Associate Clinical Professor
Dr. Hahn is a Doctor of Audiology and Speech-Language Pathologist. He is the Director of Audiology Education for the program. In addition, he is a University Senator and Liaison to the Senate IT Policy Committee. He is a member of the CAS Curriculum Committee and the A&S Advisors Committee. Dr. Hahn serves as the Faculty Advisor for NSSLHA.
Jill Hauser, M.S., CCC-SLP
Visiting Instructor
Mrs. Hauser is a speech-language pathologist whose professional interests include the treatment of speech sound production and language disorders in children and the use of augmentative and alternative communication. She received both her Bachelor’s and Master’s degree from the University of Kentucky. She has experience working in the public schools where she provided speech services at the elementary, middle, and high school levels. She has also worked in the pediatric, outpatient clinic setting where she provided intervention for children with a variety of developmental and acquired conditions. She also has experience supervising graduate clinicians throughout her career.
Sarah Heimkreiter, M.S., CCC-SLP
Associate Clinical Lecturer
Mrs. Heimkreiter attended the University of Kentucky and Miami University for her Undergraduate Degree. She also received her Masters from Miami University. She has worked in the School Setting for 21+ years. Her professional interests include School Law and the delivery of Speech-Language Pathology Services in the Schools as well as Language and Literacy and Telepractice Services. She specializes in Speech and language services to School Age and Adolescents. Her interests include school-age language and literacy and social communication skills.
Andrea Jutte, M.S., CCC-SLP
Visiting Instructor
Andrea Jutte is a speech-language pathologist who has worked in the schools and long-term care facilities. Her interests are AAC, executive functioning skills and their application to school aged children and adolescents. She teaches the alternative and augmentative communication course.
Kelly Knollman-Porter, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Associate Professor
Dr. Knollman-Porter, is a speech-language pathologist with over 25 years of experience working with adults with acquired brain injury. Her research is currently funded by NIH and focuses on the implementation of technological supports to facilitate reading comprehension for adults with aphasia. Additional research addresses the development of diagnostic and treatment methods for adults with cognitive-communication disorders associated with concussion/mTBI. Dr. Knollman-Porter currently directs the Miami University Concussion Management Program and the Miami University Aphasia Support Group. She was recently a recipient of the Robert H. and Nancy J. Blayney Endowed Professorship.
Gerard (Trace) Poll, Ph.D., CCC-SLP
Associate Professor
Dr. Poll is a speech-language pathologist whose research focuses on developmental language disorders in school-aged children, adolescents, and young adults. He is interested in developing better assessment practices and better defining the cognitive and linguistic characteristics of language-learning disorders. His work also focuses on enabling adolescents with disabilities to be better prepared for the transition from K-12 education to adult settings such as post-secondary training, employment, and community participation. Current work in his lab focuses on the development of a social communication assessment for at-risk adolescents and young adults.
Melanie Romaine-Jongewaard, MS, CCC-SLP
Visiting Faculty
Melanie Romaine-Jongewaard is a Speech-Language Pathologist with 30 years of experience in the acute care inpatient environment, currently working full time at Cincinnati Children’s Medical Center. She received both her Bachelor’s and Master’s degree from Miami University. Her clinical interests include dysphagia across the lifespan with a specialty in infant feeding and swallowing. She is certified in both Fiberoptic Endoscopic Evaluation of Swallowing and Video Fluoroscopic Swallowing Studies using the Modified Barium Swallow Impairment Profile. She is a Certified Lactation Counselor and Certified In the use of the Newborn Behavioral Observation System with an emphasis on babies and families living with substance use disorder.
Aaron Shield, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Dr. Shield is a linguist whose interests include how language develops in typical and atypical children, particularly deaf and hearing children acquiring sign language, deaf and hearing children on the autism spectrum, and children with childhood apraxia of speech. He is particularly interested in the social and cognitive skills required to access language and how deficits in these skills can impair language development. He also studies the effects of sign language exposure on children with autism and children with apraxia of speech.
Connie Szymczak, Au.D., CCC-A
Clinical Instructor
Connie Szymczak has a Doctorate in Audiology and provides diagnostic and rehabilitative hearing sciences in the Miami University Speech and Hearing Clinic. She has over 38 years of experience diagnosing hearing problems in patients ages 1 day old to 105 years old. At the beginning of her career, she specialized in neurological aspects of hearing and balance and pediatric diagnostic audiology. She has contributed to the development of several audiology programs in acute care hospitals, physician offices, schools, and private practice centers. Her current passion is to optimize amplification for patients with difficult hearing problems with a special focus on the geriatric population. She is a clinical instructor of graduate students.
Megan Wagner, M.A., CCC-SLP
Visiting Instructor
Mrs. Wagner is a speech-language pathologist whose specialization is school-age speech and language. She received her bachelor’s degree from The Ohio State University and master’s degree from Miami University. After beginning her career at Miami Valley Hospital on the inpatient rehab unit, she has worked in the school setting with children from kindergarten through sixth grade for the last 14 years. Her interests include motor speech disorders, language development, and social communication skills. In her free time, she enjoys spending time with her husband and three daughters, running, and traveling with friends and family.