Frank R. Kleffner Lifetime Clinical Career Award 1998 - 2007

2007

Nickola Wolf Nelson
Professor, Department of Speech Pathology and Audiology
Director of Interdisciplinary Health Studies
Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan

Nickola Wolf Nelson is recognized for her visionary leadership, clinical excellence, and passionate advocacy for students with language learning disabilities. From her early work on the relationship between oral and written language processing by children with reading problems, which led to the first study of classroom discourse, Dr. Nelson has built a strong history of participatory field research upon which to base interventions. Her pioneering work has resulted in linkages between language research and clinical practice in authentic classroom settings. Through system theory and ethnographic principles of investigation, she has explored the interactive influences of context and created innovative approaches to assessing and treating children with language disorders across listening, speaking, reading and writing skills. She also developed the writing laboratory approach to addressing children’s written and oral expression. Her collective work bridges the mission of the speech-language pathologist to meet the needs of the student struggling in the classroom with collaboration for the classroom teacher and special educator. She is known nationally and internationally for translating these concepts into practical applications for working clinicians and students, also reflected through her numerous textbooks, journal publications, and clinical materials. The ASHFoundation honors Dr. Nelson for significantly altering the way speech-language pathologists assess and treat school-aged language disorders and for changing the lives of hundreds of students.

2006

Janina K. Casper

Janina Casper is recognized for her lifetime contributions as a clinician and clinical instructor, author, mentor, and lecturer in the area of medical speech-language pathology for more than five decades. Described as an innovator and team builder by her colleagues, Casper's knowledge and skills span from diagosis to evidence-based practice with a primary focus in voice and voice disorders. She was instrumental in conceiving and developing several unique programs in the Syracuse, NY area that continue to this day: the first Laryngectomee Rehabilitation Group, a vibrant Cleft Palate/Craniofacial Center, and involvement as one of the founders of The Syracuse Voice Center and its multidisciplinary team. Her career and reputation as the consummate professional and patient advocate is further complemented by her scholarly endeavors as co-author of two textbooks for practicing clinicians, one on laryngectomy and head/neck cancer rehabilitation and another on understanding voice problems. She has shared her expertise through more than 50 peer-reviewed publications, and through presentations and symposia in the US and abroad, and has served as co-investigator of several research projects.The ASHFoundation recognizes Casper for her multiple contributions as a respected clinical researcher and leading expert in voice care who has greatly advanced the discipline.

2005

Edward Gage Conture

Edward G. Conture is recognized for his lasting influence on the clinical practice of speech-language pathology, especially in the area of childhood stuttering, over more than three decades. Dr. Conture’s work has moved the discipline of stuttering research and practice from a strictly motor approach and philosophy to understanding moments of stuttering as a language based phenomena. His recent research has focused on the linguistic processes of children who stutter as well as on the linkage of stuttering to temperament variables such as shyness and fearfulness. A proponent of multi-disciplinary treatment, he has worked closely with clinical psychologists in order to address the various emotional aspects so often associated with the disorder of stuttering. His laboratory is his clinic; he maintains a full weekly schedule of diagnostics, parent-child stuttering groups, and several individual therapy sessions, with clinical practice grounded in current theory and research. Among his colleagues, students, and families, he is recognized as a scientist, mentor, and master clinician. Internationally, he has earned a reputation as one of the world’s leading authorities on childhood stuttering, and his work is represented in hundreds of publications, media, and presentations. The Foundation recognizes Dr. Conture for his lifetime body of research and clinical expertise that have transformed identification and diagnostic procedures and profoundly altered the management protocols used with children and adults who stutter.

2004

Barbara Williams Hodson

Barbara Hodson is honored for her pioneering work in phonology, representing a major paradigm shift in how phonological disorders are assessed and treated, particularly in understanding the phonological system of children who are profoundly unintelligible. Her clinical work is based on research, and she began practicing evidenced-based intervention long before it was widely discussed in the field. Her cycles intervention approach is recognized and used internationally. This treatment allows immediate success and builds self-esteem, often lacking in children with such pervasive impairments. Dr. Hodson has produced over 50 research-based clinical articles. She is perhaps best known for co-authoring the text, Targeting Intelligible Speech, and for developing the test, Assessment of Phonological Processes, now in their second and third editions. She continues to pursue cutting edge research with recent work documenting the exact nature of some of the relationships between early phonological skills and later literacy abilities. She has also expanded her work to metaphonological assessment and intervention and is currently piloting a tool for preschool children in this area. Due to her vision, hundreds of children have become effective communicators and better readers, and generations of professionals have accelerated their knowledge and skills.

2003

David A. Daly

David A. Daly is honored for nearly 40 years of dedicated service as a clinical researcher, practitioner, teacher, and mentor. Daly's scholarly work and unique practice approaches have profoundly enhanced the lives of individuals who stutter, their families, and professionals. His professional interest arose from his personal journey with an unremediated fluency disorder throughout his youth and adolescence. His special expertise with cluttering disorders has helped the field to define, differentially diagnose, and treat an area previously neglected. Known as an international authority in fluency disorders, Daly has published three influential books, six book chapters, and more than 40 articles, with his treatment guides for stuttering and cluttering among the most widely used protocols in the field. His strategies for difficult-to-serve populations have inspired countless clinicians, and his motivational workshop presentations throughout the world have significantly advanced the state of the art of fluency treatment in the latter half of the 20th century.

2002

Donnell F. Johns

Donnell F. Johns was honored posthumously for his multiple contributions to clinical research and practice over 40 years of dedicated service to individuals with communication disorders.

As a clinical service provider, clinical researcher, clinical teacher, and clinical mentor, Dr. Johns worked throughout his career to expand theory and practice. He received his doctorate in speech pathology and audiiology jointly from Florida State University and the University of Minnesota in 1968, and was a pre- and postdoctoral Fellow in Neurology at the Mayo Graduate School of Medicine. A pioneering contributor to the arena of medical speech-language pathology, Dr. Johns was best known for his expertise with surgical rehabilitation of cleft/craniofacial disorders, communication disorders related to neurogenic pathologies, wound healing-tissue regeneration research, and resident graduate medical education. His keen diagnostic skills and creative intervention strategies spanned the full age spectrum from infancy to geriatrics. His colleagues note that his contributions in the operating theater are most unique. As first assistant on more than 800 pharyngeal flap procedures, it was his direction that guided the surgeon's hand and allowed proper surgical management for patients with orofacial pathology. His numerous publications and presentations extend across medical, surgical, and dental specialities. Dr. Johns was commended for bringing a far-reaching understanding and appreciation of the importance of contributions made by speech-language pathologists and audiologists to this cross-disciplinary audience.

Dr. Johns passed away in September 2002. He was told of his being named the 2002 Kleffner Awardee shortly before his death.

2001

Elisabeth Hemmersam Wiig

Elisabeth Wiig - scholar, educator, mentor, editor, consultant, and specialty product designer/developer - is honored for over 30 years of clinical contributions in the assessment and measurement of language disorders in children.

Dually certified in audiology and speech-language pathology, she began her career as an educator in her native Denmark and continued to share her academic talents as professor at the University of Michigan, Boston University, and Texas Christian University. She extended her services beyond the classroom by publishing seminal professional textbooks and journal articles on language assessment and intervention and by developing diagnostic assessment tools. In 1989 she retired as full-time teacher to pursue her passion for exploring new ways in which to treat children, adolescents, and adults with language-learning difficulties. Dr. Wiig is perhaps best known for designing and developing The Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals (CELF, in collaboration with Semel and Secord), a tool generally considered to be among the most reliable in diagnosing language disorders in children and adolescents. Currently president of the company she established in 1995, the Knowledge Research Institute, Dr. Wiig continues to dedicate her clinical ingenuity to enhancing the knowledge base for language-learning assessment and intervention strategies.

2000

Laura Ann Wilber

Laura Ann Wilber, professor of audiology and hearing sciences at Northwestern University, is recognized for nearly 50 years of clinical service, teaching, and professional advocacy.

Among her most prestigious contributions is work with the American National Standards Institute to develop standards for acoustic impedance measures, pure tone and bone conduction audiometry, and measurements for room noise and assistive listening devices. Wilber was among the first to recognize the need for professional licensure, and her scientific publications reflected contributions to detection of hearing disorders and test construction and reliability.

1999

Margaret Lahey

The Foundation recognized Dr. Lahey for a professional career that has been entirely devoted to advancing clinical research and practice. She began as a speech-language pathologist in the schools, followed by university clinical education programs, private practice and program consultation. Her career as a practicing clinician led to her concern over the need for knowledge that could inform clinical practice with children who had problems in learning and using language. Her contributions have substantially influenced the lives of thousands of children.

Dr. Lahey has published widely on prosody and syllable structure, syntax, lexicon, writing, psychometric considerations, family history factors, and many other areas. She is perhaps best known for the Content-Form-Use language model, introduced in the landmark 1978 Lahey and Bloom text, Language Development and Language Disorders. This approach revolutionized clinical treatment in child language and continues to be an important guide. She has attracted great admiration and respect from countless clinicians, students, and peers in academia. As one nominator eloquently remarked, her name itself has become part of everyday clinical parlance as an adjective, a common noun, and even a verb. How many language clinicians have reported that they "Lahey’d the sample and he was at Phase 6?"

The Foundation honors Dr. Lahey for setting the example for clinical thinking and for her critical role as a unifying force for bridging science and clinical practice.

1998

Martha Taylor Sarno

Viewed by her colleagues as the preeminent clinical aphasiologist in the world, the Foundation recognizes Professor Sarno for her leadership in the development of clinical practice in speech-language pathology, specifically in neurogenic communication disorders. In 1949 she affiliated with the Rusk Institute, the first rehabilitation center in the country, and was one of the first speech-language pathologists appointed to a medical school faculty.

The scope of her pioneering work is vast, but she is perhaps best known for creating the first functional communication measure (1952, Functional Communication Profile), which has been revised and continues to be used as a clinical and research instrument. Functional communication both as a basis of measurement and a treatment objective is now universal in the profession. One of the first attempts to determine the efficacy of aphasia rehabilitation was described in a paper she co-authored in 1957. Numerous clinical studies followed and, in 1997, she published the first set of data to systematically show the changes in quality of life that may be associated with therapy during the first year post stroke. Considering the healthcare demands for accountability in the last 5 years, her 50 year dedication and work in this area is considered even more visionary.

Professor Sarno pioneered the development of publications for lay use by families, and she established one of the first education and support groups for families of aphasic patients in the 1950s. Her nominators note that, even in light of measured professional successes, her greatest achievement has always been putting clients, their families, their friends and their lives first. It is perhaps this interest that led her to found the National Aphasia Association (NAA) in 1987, a national advocacy organization committed to public education and the protection and care of the aphasia community. Her impact has been felt internationally, where her publications and books have been translated into as many as 12 languages, and in Ecuador, Columbia, Mexico, Sweden and Japan, where she has set up aphasia rehabilitation programs and organized international meetings. She has been awarded a Doctor of Medicine honoris causa by the University of Goteberg School of Medicine, Sweden, an honor generally reserved for physicians who have made outstanding scientific contributions in their field.

Above all, Professor Sarno's colleagues describe her as one of the most caring, intellectual, accomplished, innovative, and dynamic individuals they know. The Foundation honors her for her deep commitment to helping individuals and to actively contributing an extensive knowledge base to the field of communication disorders.