Dear CAPCSD Member.

Below are the upcoming anticipated dates so that you may plan accordingly. Dates are subject to change. CAPCSD will send separate email for each of the below dates with official information.

Scholarships Are Now Open

We are pleased to announce CAPCSD’s annual scholarship programs are now open. CAPCSD’s strategic investment and long-standing commitment across several decades to building a robust pipeline of speech pathology and audiology professionals remains strong and unwavering.

One of our biggest professional existential challenges is the recognized shortage of individuals with doctoral degrees who can serve as educators and mentors to train future professionals. CAPCSD’s survey of doctoral scholarship recipients indicates that over 85% of recipients complete their doctoral education and continue to positions as academic faculty. Additionally, graduate students receiving research scholarships have contributed to the growth of evidence-based practice in our discipline. Students receiving recognition for service have emerged as volunteer leaders across many professional organizations.

Students in CAPCSD member programs with membership paid in full no later than September 15, 2025, are eligible to apply to three different scholarship competitions, each with its unique focus, as described below.

Frances J. Laven Scholarship: Up to ten graduate students (Master's SLP, Au.D., or SLPD) who reflect the values of exemplary service to the profession will be awarded this scholarship created in honor of Frances J. Laven. Frances was the co-owner of CAPCSD’s first management company, working tirelessly for CAPCSD and facilitating its growth for several years.

Plural Publishing Research Scholarships: Two graduate research scholarships (one Master's/Au.D. and one Ph.D. level) will be awarded to assist recipients in completing a specific research project. These scholarships are offered and awarded with gratitude for the generosity of Plural Publishing and their support of CAPCSD.

Ph.D. Scholarships: Up to ten Ph.D. scholarships will be awarded to qualified applicants who are pursuing their doctoral education in speech-language pathology and audiology.

Learn more about this year’s competitions, deadlines and submit your application here.

As our efforts to promote and support the growth of our future professionals continue, we encourage CAPCSD members to share information about these scholarship opportunities with their students.

Lisa Scott Leadership Academy

Annual Conference Call for Papers

Call for Papers Topics: check out the Call for Papers topics on the webpage where you'll see a "Sessions under this topic might address" for each topic.

• Advanced Work in IPE/IPP
• Artificial Intelligence (AI)
• Clinical Education & Supervision
• Scholarship of Teaching & Learning (SoTL)
• Student Success
• Teaching Pedagogy & Curriculum
• Additional Topic Areas not included above

Submission Details:

• Select Submission Type: 90-minute, 60-minute, 30-minute poster
• Select Track(s): Academic, Clinical, Administrative
• Select Type of Presentation: Research, Professional Education
• Provide Abstract (125 word maximum)
• Provide Author(s)
• Provide Learning Objectives (3)
• Provide Presentation Information for Evaluation: provide information for each category of rubric regarding your paper/poster submission so that reviewers may score your submission accordingly. 

Notes:

• All submissions will be reviewed by three volunteer reviewers.
• Individuals may submit multiple Call for Papers proposals but will not be selected to present more than twice at the conference among all types of sessions (plenary, call for papers, invited, standing).
• Individuals may be listed as authors on more than two selected submissions, but may not present during more than two sessions.
• Evaluation rubric can be found on Call for Papers / Posters webpage.

Key Principles in CSD Clinical Education Course

CAPCSD Members: Log in with your CAPCSD credentials (top right corner of Elevate), add the course to your cart, and it will be free at checkout. Share this valuable resource with your clinical educators—just be sure to provide them with the discount code (available in the CAPCSD Info Hub).

Clinical Instructors Supervising for CAPCSD Members (known as Partners in Elevate): You’re eligible for free access using a discount code from your CAPCSD university liaison. Be sure to get the code before registering, as refunds cannot be issued after purchase. If you took a CAPCSD online course in the past, please use the login on the left hand navigation with same email address and click on "Forgot Password".  

DEIB

The most pressing questions we continue to hear, sometimes through vigorous dissent, are:

• How do we preserve our focus on diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging (DEIB) in the best interests of students, faculty, and those we serve when, in some states, these terms have been restricted from curriculum, syllabi, and course content?
• How do we keep advancing DEIB after the 2023 standards were replaced?
• What will change—and what will I have to change?

Part One Response
The CAPCSD DEIB Committee invites our member programs to share their strategies, recommendations, and commitments to sustaining DEIB efforts. We are seeking concrete examples of how programs are innovating, adapting, and prioritizing this work for the underrepresented students, faculty, administrators, and communities we serve.

Please send your recommendations, plans for sustaining DEIB, and descriptions of successful initiatives to admin@capcsd.org. In future updates, we will highlight your contributions as part of a collective roadmap -- we know that collaboration transforms individual efforts into stronger, more inspired outcomes.

Acknowledging the Challenge
This has been a difficult year for our professions. Programs have been striving to build equitable standards amid shifting policies: the Supreme Court’s ruling against race-conscious admissions, a growing wave of state-level bills curbing DEI efforts in higher education, and the seemingly ongoing dismissal of over 40+ years of established research. Yet, to uphold our foundational documents—including the ASHA Scope of Practice and Code of Ethics—we must persist in doing the work we have always done, AND discover new ways to do it.

Looking Ahead
Your contributions will inform not only this Part One Response but also our forthcoming Part Two, where we will integrate and amplify your strategies. Together, we can uphold the values of equity and belonging while continuing to prepare practitioners who serve with integrity, compassion, and justice.

Kimberly Green Ed.D., CCC-SLP
Chair, DEIB Committee

Leslie Grubler, Ed.D., CCC-SLP
VP Organizational Advancement
Monitoring Officer of the DEIB Committee

The Council on Academic Accreditation (CAA) and accreditation staff are hosting an important outreach session to discuss the recent revisions to Standard 3.4 A/B. This session is designed to provide clarity, answer questions, and support programs in understanding and implementing the revised standard for anyone involved in the accreditation process.

• September 5 at 11:00 a.m. EDT – Register Here

Board Buddy Q&A

CAPCSD's Board of Directors assigned a "Board Buddy" to each of its new board members to help transition into their three-year terms on the CAPCSD Board of Directors. To help our CAPCSD member programs get to know our new board members, each month the newsletter will feature a board buddy asking the new board member questions. For the second month, Ashley Harkrider, Treasurer, posed these questions to John McCarthy, VP of Research and Academic Affairs.

Ashley Harkrider, Ph.D., is Interim Dean and Professor of the Department of Audiology and Speech Pathology and Director of the Human Auditory Physiology Laboratory at University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Knoxville. This is her fourth year as Treasurer on the CAPCSD Board of Directors.

John McCarthy, Ph.D., CCC-SLP, is the Dean of the College of Health Sciences and Professions and a Professor of Hearing, Speech, and Language Science at Ohio University. John joined the CAPCSD Board of Directors as VP Research and Academic Affairs on July 1, 2025.

Ashley: What excites you most about CAPCSD’s mission?

John: It is the idea of connections. I see people who are working so hard across the country to educate students in innovative ways and through a variety of challenges. We learn lessons along the way and can help each other succeed. I’m happy to be a part of that.

Ashley: Will you share some professional experiences or skills that you bring that you believe will contribute to the success of this board?

John: My research area is working with individuals who use augmentative and alternative communication. Working with people with complex communication needs means I’ve always had to work with multidisciplinary teams in an approach with short and long terms foci.

As a dean, there is value in seeing both the commonalities and different approaches across health professions. I am leading one of the 10 largest health focused public colleges in the country with 14 different accreditors. Prior to being dean, I was a program director covering SLP and AuD so I’ve seen the department level as well. Prior to that I worked as a school based SLP in central Pennsylvania and that gave me insight into the clinical side.

In CAPCSD I was a founding member of the IPE/IPP Committee and have served on the relatively new Academic Affairs Committee.

Ashley: Is there a particular cause or project that you’re passionate about within our field?

John: Interprofessional education and collaborative practice has always been a passion of mine. However, as dean I saw our nursing school transition to a competency-based education approach. I am very interested how CBE can add a new dimension to how we think about IPE so that intersection is the blend of a couple of different interests for me.

Ashley: What is one thing you’d like to accomplish during your time on the board?

John: I hope to build connections. Research and academic affairs should touch every program. I hope I present avenues so that every program finds a way to see themselves in CAPCSD and connect in the ways that make sense for them.

Ashley: Do you have any hidden talents or unique skills that might surprise us?

John: My undergraduate degree is in Voice Performance. I am a classically trained singer. I’d say it’s surprising although I do meet a fair number of SLPs who are also musicians. Can someone study that?

Ashley: What’s something new you’ve recently learned or tried for the first time?

John: My older son was interested in rock climbing. Although I didn’t know anything about it, I learned and even tried it myself while taking him to indoor and outdoor places.

Ashley: If you could travel anywhere in the world, where would you go and why?

John: Greece. I read a lot of Ancient Greek history and philosophy in college and have always wanted to visit there.                                                               

Ashley Harkrider
Treasurer
Treasurer@capcsd.org  

John McCarthy

VP Research and Academic Affairs                vpraa@capcsd.org  

Admissions Corner

With the CSDCAS admissions portal open a little over a month, now is a good time to help your undergraduate and transfer students learn to access it as they apply for next year’s graduate programs.

My Department presents information about CSDCAS in three different Fall semester meetings:

• Our local NSSLHA group hosts a meeting
• We look at our upper-level courses and schedule a meeting when there are no class conflicts
• We reserve a class period in our undergraduate professional issues course

In these three meetings, we walk students through the following:

• Identifying and exploring graduate programs of interest using ASHA's EdFind search engine (find.asha.org/ed)
• Setting up a new CSDCAS account
• Selecting graduate programs in CSDCAS
• Understanding CSDCAS language (e.g., "evaluations" = "letters of recommendation")
• Filling in the different parts of the main application
• Organizing and completing individual program requirements

Applying to graduate school for audiology or speech-language pathology is stressful and at times confusing for students. We can reduce their stress and confusion by spending a little time helping them navigate the application process. Undergraduate students applying to our professional programs will always be grateful for the help.

Douglas F. Parham, Ph.D., CCC-SLP

VP Admissions

https://www.capcsd.org                                                                                                                                                                                        September 2025