Adrian KC Lee, ScD, Chair

Thank you for visiting the UW Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences' website. Whether you are a prospective student, an alumnus, a client or a colleague, we are pleased that you are taking a closer look at our department.

Our department’s mission is to use our unique strengths in basic and clinical sciences to promote excellence in education, research and clinical service delivery to those with communication disorders. To carry out this mission our department has 32 professors / lecturers and an additional 8 adjunct / affiliate professors from various UW departments and from the industry. The Department’s professorial faculty is responsible for $15 million in grant dollars that supports ongoing laboratory research and graduate student funding.

The Department has a large, busy non-profit UW Speech and Hearing Clinic. Our clinic is a center of excellence in education, research, and clinical practice serving speech, language and hearing needs within the University and the community. Serving our mission are 15 clinical faculty who supervise and carry out our clinical education program in all aspects of speech-language pathology and audiology. We also have many dedicated clinical supervisors and affiliates in the community who support our clinical education program and help our clinical students to become independent practitioners. Our clinic has over 5,000 clinic visits each year by people of all ages and provides a solid foundation for the clinical education of 120 graduate students at various levels of study.

Along with our successes we face new challenges. Many people are surprised to learn that in 1970, public funds met 40% of our budget needs as a university – today this figure is down to 14%, and the trend seems set to continue. We call on our alumni and friends to make a difference. We cannot maintain excellence without your time, talent, and financial support. You can support our mission by contributing to an established endowment or by donating to support an activity of importance to you.

We hope you will find this website informative and helpful. We invite you to explore our programs of study, our research and our clinic. We welcome visits to our campus and our department. If you have questions please do not hesitate to contact us.

Thank you and welcome!

Professor Adrian KC Lee

Department Chair

Chair History