Program Awards

The University of Arkansas Communication Sciences and Disorders degree program annually salutes its best. Mentor of the Year honors one outstanding community partner, and the top second-year graduate students are honored as Outstanding Clinician or Outstanding Student with a first-year graduate student cited for Emerging Excellence (as a future speech-language pathologist).

Award Recipients

Where available, articles about each honoree are linked to their names.

	Mentor of the Year	Outstanding Clinician	Outstanding Student	Emerging Excellence
2025	Janea Darby	Morgan Little	Sarah Paddock	Leslie Williams
2024	Carrie Millar	Heather Prinz	Abigail Hagner	Karina Escobar
2023	Tamara Henschel	Katie Motherwell	Charles Totten	Sutton Bauman
2022	Alyson Rawlings	Melissa Leffel	Sydnie Morgan	Cindy Landeros
2021	Marla Reeves	Kendra Ledbetter	Madeline Rudolph	Samadhi Pusuba Devayalage
2020	Megan Fraser	Elizabeth Ocampo-Roman	Madilyn Littlefield	Yudith Martinez
2019	Melissa Walker	Bailey Pearson	Naomi Gillett	Machen Beard
2018	Kelly Thomas	Sydnie Wilkins	Jasmine Nile	Lindsay Richards
2017	Maureen Fernicola	Abigail Kymer-Davis	Rebecca Torres
2016	Laura Baxter

 

Award Descriptions

Mentor of the Year — This is awarded to an off-campus clinical supervisor of our graduate students each year. Graduate students provide nominations, and a program committee narrows the nominations down to determine a winner. This award provides the program and our graduate students an opportunity to highlight the work of off-campus clinical supervisors who often go far above and beyond the requirements of clinical supervision. We know that our clinical supervisors are some of the best in the country, and this provides a small way for us to show our appreciation for all they do.

Outstanding Clinician — This award goes to a second-year graduate student who has consistently received high clinical skills evaluations from U of A faculty as well as their off-campus clinical supervisors. Top scoring students are reviewed each year, and a faculty vote is completed to determine the winner of this award. This student is one who takes pride in and critically thinks through lesson planning to make sure speech-language therapy sessions are not only well designed for the individual’s needs but also are motivating and functional for the individual. Additionally, this student is noted to maintain excellent clinical documentation and exhibit outstanding skills in professionalism.

Outstanding Student — This award goes to a second-year graduate student who has set themselves apart in both clinical and academic contexts of the program. Faculty nominate students, and a faculty vote is completed to determine the winner of this award. This is a student who has not only done well academically but who has also consistently participated in opportunities outside the classroom to further their education. This might include things like completing a master’s thesis, participating in a research lab, completing a project, or participating or organizing a community service event.

Emerging Excellence — This award goes to a first-year graduate student who has set themselves apart in the classroom and as a student-clinician. This student is well-prepared for class assignments and clinical experiences and demonstrates an ability to motivate classmates to think critically and engage in scholarly discussions. Students are nominated by faculty, and a faculty vote is completed to determine the winner of this award.