Admission Requirements
Applicants must meet all Graduate School admission requirements. The applicant process is competitive and students must meet the following additional requirements:
- minimum overall GPA of 3.0 or a 3.2 GPA on the last 60 hours attempted.
- three letters of recommendation from individuals qualified to assess such abilities,
- a letter of application that describes his or her research interests and professional goals.
Applicants may be interviewed by the Graduate Admissions Committee and/or other relevant faculty of the Department of Communication Disorders. Typically, students are admitted to the program on a yearly basis only during the Fall Quarter of each year.
Applicants must have completed or be in the process of completing a baccalaureate degree from a regionally accredited institution. Previous academic preparation in communication disorders at the baccalaureate level is not a prerequisite for admission under this plan. This applicant must meet the admission requirements noted above.
Meeting the minimum admission standards of the Department of Communication Disorders, College of Liberal Arts, or the Graduate School does not guarantee admission. The departmental Admissions Committee and other relevant faculty carefully review all applicants and recommend for admission those applicants who are evaluated as being the best qualified for doctoral study in audiology.
Degree Requirements
Students admitted to the AuD program will be given a copy of the current degree requirements. All students must complete the required coursework, a dissertation or research project, and oral and written comprehensive examinations. The student will be required to complete the clinical practicum requirements necessary for professional certification and licensure which includes a clinical residency. The program is a full-time in-residence (including summers) program normally requiring four years to complete.
Program of Study for the AuD
The doctoral program in audiology is designed to meet the academic, clinical practicum, and degree requirements of the ASHA for certification and the licensure requirements of the LBESPA for entry-level practice as an audiologist. The academic and clinical components of the AuD interface in a logical manner through the training sequence. The earliest portion of the program includes intensive academic training in conjunction with the progressive development of clinical skills. During the third year of the program, students are involved in a series of intensive clinical externships and return to campus for academic course work, development of the dissertation or research project, and the comprehensive examinations. In the fourth year, students complete a full-time clinical residency in facilities/clinical sites with which the program has established clinical affiliation agreements. Also in the fourth year, students complete all degree requirements including the dissertation or research project.
A foundation of prerequisite knowledge and skills is required. Proficiency in understanding and using English sufficient to achieve effective clinical and professional interactions with clients and relevant others is expected of all doctoral students. In addition, the student must have prerequisite skills and knowledge of life sciences, physical sciences, behavioral sciences, and mathematics. Course work in these four areas may be demonstrated through transcript credit from a baccalaureate degree and is also available at Louisiana Tech University.
Students will be expected to take a minimum of nine semester credit hours of related course work that may be chosen from areas such as counseling, statistics, professional and technical writing, biomedical engineering, and educational psychology. The specific courses in the related areas must be approved by the student’s Planning Committee.
The approved degree program will include a minimum of 133 semester credit hours and meet the academic and practicum requirements for the Certificate of Clinical Competence in Audiology of the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association and the licensure requirements for entry-level practice as an audiologist in the state of Louisiana. Each student’s program of study will be individualized to some degree but the following core courses are required to meet minimum AuD requirements:
| Required Professional Core (minimum) |
64 |
| Related Areas (minimum) |
9-12 |
| Supervised Practica (minimum) |
27 |
| Dissertation or Research Project (minimum) |
12-15 |
| Clinical Residency (minimum) |
18 |
| Total Program Hours (minimum) |
133 |
Clinical Practicum Training
Time spent in clinical practicum experiences will occur throughout the doctoral program and will be planned to provide for the progressive development of clinical skills. Students must obtain a variety of clinical practicum experiences in different work settings and with different populations in order to demonstrate skills across the scope of practice in audiology. Acceptable clinical practicum experience can include clinical and administrative activities directly related to patient/client care. In compliance with the certification requirements of the ASHA, the aggregate total of clinical experience will equal 52 work weeks. A week of clinical practicum has been defined by the ASHA as a minimum of 35 hours per week in direct patient/client contact, consultation, record keeping, and administrative duties relevant to audiology service delivery. The supervised activities must be within the scope of practice of audiology. The student will complete a clinical residency in the final year of the AuD program.
Doctoral Comprehensive Examination
The purpose of the doctoral comprehensive examination is to determine whether competencies in the field of audiology have been achieved through course work and clinical training experiences. All degree candidates must register for and pass SPCH 685: Comprehensive Exam in Audiology , both written and oral parts. A maximum of two attempts is allowed. Students who fail to pass the written and/or oral section on the second attempt will be dismissed from the program.
The comprehensive examination must be successfully completed at the end of the third year of study and prior to approval to begin the Clinical Residency. After satisfactory completion of the comprehensive examination in audiology, the student will be granted doctoral candidacy.
Dissertation or Research Project
Students will have the option to complete either a dissertation or research project. This is required of all students in the AuD program. It is the responsibility of the student to comply with all dissertation or research project requirements set forth by the Department of Communication Disorders, the College of Liberal Arts, and the Graduate School. Fifteen semester hours of academic credit must be earned for the dissertation, and twelve semester hours of academic work must be earned for the research project. The student must enroll for these credit hours for each academic quarter while engaged in dissertation or research project activities. If the dissertation or research project is complete prior to the quarter in which the degree is to be conferred, the student must be enrolled for a minimum of three semester hours in the quarter in which he or she expects to graduate.
Complete guidelines for the dissertation option and the research project option are available in the School of Communication’s Department of Communication Disorders and the Department’s website.