All Program Reviews for Speech Language Pathology
| Academic Year | Status | |
|---|---|---|
| 2025-2026 | Submitted | Current |
| 2018-2019 | Submitted | View |
Speech Language Pathology
2025-2026 Program Review
1 ) In 3-5 sentences, describe your unit to an audience of potential students. Many units take this information from their website. If it has been awhile since your unit has updated its website, take this opportunity to design a brief description of your unit for today’s students.
The Speech-Language Pathology Assistant (SLPA) Program prepares students to earn the Associate in Science degree in Speech-Language Pathology. With this degree, the SLPA student can apply for SLPA registration in the State of California. This degree prepares students to assist Speech-Language Pathologists in treating disorders of communication. Such disorders may be related to articulation and phonology, child and adult language, motor speech, voice, fluency, and hearing. Topics include an introduction to the field of communication disorders, articulation and phonology for the SLPA, professional issues and practices in speech-language pathology, speech/language/hearing clinical strategies, clinical considerations in service delivery to clients with communication disorders, and fieldwork experience. Registered SLPAs primarily work in educational settings and private practices.
2 ) Who is disproportionately impacted in your unit?
Upon reviewing the SLPA Program DI data for successful course completion, there are a few groups with statistically significant outcomes when compared to the entire student body enrolled within the SLPA core courses: African American, Female, Non-Veteran, and persons with No Disability.
Use the Disproportionate Impact* reports below to answer question #2. These reports show how student achievement outcomes vary by gender, race/ethnicity, veteran, foster youth, disability, and income/poverty level status to enable users to engage in more advanced student-centered and equity-centered analysis, reflection, and planning. These reports are integrated with ARC's Data on Demand system to provide users with more sophisticated and nuanced ways of exploring their unit's data. To access the reports, you may be prompted to log in to ARC's Data on Demand system. If so, click on "Log in with ARC Portal" and enter your Los Rios single sign-on credentials (same as Canvas or Intranet).
*This link provides the California Community College Chancellor's Office's definition of disproportionate impact.
Disproportionate Impact
The disproportionate impact (DI) links now direct you to your unit’s DI data in ARC Data on Demand. The DI data will show which student groups are experiencing disproportionate impact for course success rates (A, B, C, Cr, P), A-B rates, and course completion rates (students who did not withdraw) at the course level.
In addition, a new report on intersectional DI (e.g., ethnicity/race by gender) is available for assessing intersectional Di for course success rates. The intersection DI report defaults to the subject code level (e.g., all ENGWR courses). Use the org tree in the side bar to filter to individual courses (click on the right arrow next to American River College, right arrow next to your division, right arrow next to your department/discipline, then select the specific course to view).
If prompted to log in, click on “Log in with ARC Portal” and enter your Los Rios single-sign on credentials (same as Canvas or Intranet).
3 ) What equity advancing actions have your programs already taken?
First semester students are enrolled in SLPA 300 (asynchronous online) - and have access to one main instructor. These students are not necessarily enrolled within the SLPA Program, but also ECE and Gerontology. Kim Vavra does an excellent job working with her students in this online format.
Kim has taken the 10-10-10 course offered by California Community Colleges and implemented their suggestions to provide effective online communication throughout the semester. Initially, the students are greeted with a welcome letter, the home page is set up with communication information as well as buttons to the beginning module sections of Canvas. She provides a survey to measure how comfortable students are with an online course, if they will need DSPS services and if they foresee any difficulties with the upcoming semester. She then provides an introduction discussion to build community and as the semester progresses, she comments on every assignment and messages students who have not turned in an assignment or are late. She includes notes in the Canvas gradebook when students reach out with concerns or difficulties so that she can stay up on student needs. She is well versed in Beaver Cares and the Health and Wellness services on Campus to make referrals and provide support as needed.
When students enroll in second semester core courses (SLPA 105 and SLPA 110), they have classes taught by both SLPA Program instructors utilizing the same "open door" policy with regard to communication. Additionally, the SLPA Program Coordinator meets with each student personally at least once during the semester to discuss academic planning, career goals, etc.
Third semester students enrolled in SLPA 115 and SLPA 120 are met with twice as they are preparing for clinical fieldwork. During these meetings the program supervisor has a private meeting with each student to discuss their future clinical fieldwork site options, including their desired location(s), service population(s) and weekly schedule availability.
Fourth semester students enrolled in SLPA 121 have regularly scheduled classroom sessions which include weekly hours review, progress competency reviews, telephone meetings. and site observations to provide close ongoing support and communication. Additionally, an Exit Interview process occurs in preparation for graduating/completing students. This meeting prepares students for employment by reviewing their up to date resumes, fieldwork hours completion and application for SLPA registration with the State of California.
4 ) What will be your unit’s strategies for eliminating disproportionate impact (DI)?
The SLPA Program will continue to the above-mentioned activities including:
- front-loading with available campus and community resources,
- providing individual feedback on assignments and quizzes/tests to improve student understanding and preparedness for industry standards, and
- utilizing the hands-on communication style with instructor availability and SLPA Program Coordinator availability
While enrolled in the SLPA Program, the SLPA students have shared their appreciation of the hands-on academic planning to assist with mapping out coursework, creating opportunities to be more marketable, and looking toward future transfer (BA/BS) and potential MA/MS completion. The SLPA students have shared that they appreciate these strategies, specifically in the Exit Interviews and when they share their first industry-specific jobs.
There are a few variables that the SLPA Program has NO control over:
- gender: this is a female-dominated industry;
- Non-Veteran: this is a personal choice of the student (military service or not) - this will not be addressed
- Non-Disabled: again, this will not be addressed
As for the DI need for the African American SLPA students - the SLPA Program faculty will continue open communication for academic planning, student academic success, career support, etc.
The SLPA Program attempts to empower all students through information, personal communication, and community/campus resources.
5 ) What support do you need to eliminate disproportionate impact (DI)?
Continued support through the Health and Education Division Administration is always wonderful, as is communication with the other HEED departments for how their industries are impacted - thus giving the SLPA Program information to potentially positively impact our SLPA students.
6 ) What other issues or concerns have affected your unit and are important for you to bring up?
The SLPA Program students have now come back to campus since COVID. This has been a positive overall. The SLPA Program is growing, with further outreach to outlying areas and students traveling quite a distance. This year's cohort has students commuting from the following areas: South Lake Tahoe, San Ramon, Concord, Davis, Vacaville, Galt, Lodi, Hidden Valley Lake, Cotati, Marysville, and Plumas Lake.
Since we are primarily an evening program, the students need access to some Student Services on campus:
- later hours for the Book Store,
- food options on campus in the evening,
- academic counseling availability in the evening, and
- extended hours for DSPS Test Proctoring for evening students.
The Enrollment, Department Set Standards, and SLO Data Set may be additional considerations and helpful for answering this optional question, but not required. To access the reports, you may be prompted to log in to ARC's Data on Demand system. If so, click on "Log in with ARC Portal" and enter your Los Rios single sign-on credentials (same as Canvas or Intranet).
Enrollment
The enrollment links now direct you to your unit’s enrollment data in ARC Data on Demand (5 years of duplicated enrollment for Fall or Spring terms). Using the filters available along the left side navigation in ARC Data on Demand, enrollment data can now be disaggregated or filtered on a number of course or student characteristics to provide more fine-tuned exploration and analysis of enrollment data. Examples include disaggregating by course, ethnicity/race, gender, and age.
If prompted to log in, click on “Log in with ARC Portal” and enter your Los Rios single-sign on credentials (same as Canvas or Intranet).
Department Set Standards
Shows course success rates (# of A, B, C, Cr, and P grades expressed as a % of total grade notations) compared to lower and upper thresholds. Thresholds are derived using a 95% confidence interval (click the report link for details). The lower threshold is referred to as the Department Set Standard. The upper threshold is referred to as the Stretch Goal.
- Green
- Most recent academic year exceeds the upper threshold
- Yellow
- Most recent academic year falls between the lower and upper threshold
- Red
- Most recent academic year falls below the lower threshold
The faculty's continuous review of student achievement of course SLOs is documented using the Authentic Assessment Review Record (AARR), which involves a review of student work demonstrating achievement of the course SLO. Faculty record student achievement for a randomly assigned course SLO based on one or more authentic assessments that they regularly perform in their classes. The aggregated results are then reviewed annually as part of Annual Unit Planning, in which the results may serve as the basis for actions and, if applicable, resource allocation, and are aligned with college goals and objectives.
The AARR summary link provides an aggregate of the results of the most recent AARR implementation. The AARR results by SLO link provides a more detailed view, including the specific ratings assigned by faculty to each randomly assigned course SLO, and what, if any, actions were taken.
Note: Established thresholds (i.e., green/yellow/red indicators) have yet to be developed for SLO data.
In your program review process, you may want to refer to the goals and actions in your Annual Unit Plans since your last Program Review. Follow this this link to access your previous AUP submissions. For Faculty support, please contact Daniel Slutsky at slutskd@arc.losrios.edu.