Strong College Fellow Denise Tucker Receives Audiology Grant, September 1997

Reynolds grant will be used for audiology program

[The work of Strong College Fellow Prof. Denise Tucker]

Greensboro News & Record, 14 September 1997

New testing and therapy facilities in audiology will be created and equipped at UNCG this fall through a three-year grant of $191,540 from the Kate B. Reynolds Charitable Trust of Winston-Salem.

The grant will allow the UNCG Speech and Hearing Center to expand both the variety of services and hours of operation, according to Dr. Denise A. Tucker, a visiting assistant professor in the Department of Communication, who wrote the grant proposal.

The funds will allow the hiring of a full-time audiologist to operate and supervise the audiology clinic for 40 hours weekly on a 12-month schedule.

Expanded rehabilitative services will include hearing loss education for school groups and individuals, hearing loss prevention, traditional auditory therapy training, speech reading therapy and counseling, Tucker said.

Persons in need of services can call the UNCG Speech and Hearing Center at 334-5939.

The UNCG Department of Communication is expanding its graduate program in speech and hearing, Tucker said, and the Reynolds grant will provide the necessary new equipment and space. . . .

Tucker noted that a large number of Americans—22 million adults and three million children—have permanent hearing handicaps. Of that number, an estimated 130,000 live in the Triad with hearing loss severe enough to count as a disability.

The UNCG Speech and Hearing Center has been in existence since 1967 and its clinic operation had 645 visits last year. While the center evaluates clients’ hearing loss, it is the only clinic in the region providing a range of aural rehabilitative services, including individual therapy for impairment in peripheral hearing and in central auditory processing.

The Kate B. Reynolds Trust was created in 1947 by the will of Mrs. William N. Reynolds of Winston-Salem.