Yalian Pei, assistant professor, has received support from Syracuse University’s Lerner Center Faculty Fellows Grant Program. This initiative advances science, policy or practice in public health communications or population health that could lead to external grant proposals. Pei is co-investigating the relationship among health communication discrimination, cognitive communication disorders and healthcare use among individuals with Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). Findings could advance understanding of healthcare access barriers faced by individuals with TBI. This research could also provide evidence that modifying health communication affects health quality, and resulting interventions could help reduce access disparities and improve recovery outcomes for individuals with TBI.

Professor Beth Prieve has received the Wayne J. Staab Award, which recognizes an individual who has made extraordinary contributions through service to the American Auditory Society. Prieve studies basic physiological and behavioral processes of the auditory system to improve the diagnosis of hearing loss. Prieve founded the Pediatric Audiology Laboratory at Syracuse University in 1990 and remains the director and lead researcher of the team. The lab focuses on identifying hearing loss in infants and children (birth to five years) with a particular emphasis on linking underlying auditory physiological processes to hearing impairment.

Megan Leece, research speech language pathologist, received the Distinguished Achievement Award through the New York State Speech-Language-Hearing Association (NYSSLHA) in recognition of her clinical, research and academic achievements. The award acknowledged her contributions in student training, clinical presentations, publications, clinical research design and execution of high-quality therapy in clinical trials. The award is open to members of the association who have distinguished themselves in the discipline of communication sciences and disorders and/or the professions of speech-language pathology and audiology.