Congratulations Dr Natalie Hegarty

This week Natalie Hegarty completed her PhD viva and passed with minor changes. She undertook her PhD at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland. I have thoroughly enjoyed working with Natalie and the other members of her PhD supervisory team (Dr Jill Titterington and Dr Laurence Taggart) over the past few years. We had a virtual celebration via Skype this week. Here are the blogposts I have written during her PhD journey: https://speakingmylanguages.blogspot.com/search?q=Natalie+Hegarty
Congratulations Dr Hegarty!

Happy St Patrick's Day

During 2016 I posted a St Patrick's day wish here. Later in 2016 I had the opportunity to visit Ireland and Northern Ireland and experience their generosity and hospitality. Some posts from my adventures and research with my Irish colleagues are here (Ireland) and here (Northern Ireland).
My colleague has now sent the following blessing for 2017:

May the road rise up to meet you,

May the wind be always at your back,

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

The rains fall soft upon your fields.

The beauty of Northern Ireland

Over the weekend we took time out to enjoy the beauty of Northern Ireland and were fortunate enough to find some sunshine.

The Giant's Causeway

Carrick-a-Rede

Launch of the Specific Speech Impairment Clinical Excellence Network in Northern Ireland

Today, the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists' (RCSLT) Specific Speech Impairment Clinical Excellence Network was launched in Northern Ireland by Dr Jill Titterington and colleagues. I was their invited speaker for the day. We discussed assessing children with speech sound disorders and supporting children who are multilingual. The 60+ participants were extremely enthusiastic and seemed to enjoy learning about the research and resources we have generated to enhance clinical practice when working with children. Congratulations to the SLTs of Northern Ireland.

Interesting discussions in Belfast, Northern Ireland

Over the past few days I have had the pleasure of spending time with Dr Jill Titterington and Natalie Hegarty from the University of Ulster. During the first day Jill and Natalie showed me around Belfast, highlighting important aspects of the city and its rich and complex history. We visited some sites that celebrated the work of John Hewitt and James Larkin who promoted social justice within the city. We then spent time together discussing Natalie's PhD that is considering speech-language therapists' intervention practices and knowledge when working with children with speech sound disorders.

Jill Titterington, Natalie Hegarty, Sharynne (with Tim Tams)
discussing Natalie's PhD research

Sharynne, Jill and Natalie near the James Larkin mural

Jill, Natalie, David and Sharynne at The John Hewitt, a famous pub in Belfast

New PhD student

Today I had my first meeting with Natalie Hegarty and one of her supervisors Jill Titterington (her primary supervisor is Laurence Taggart). Natalie has recently begun her PhD studies through the University of Ulster in Belfast, Northern Ireland. I have agreed to be a co-supervisor on her project. We will meet via Skype, then in person next year when I go to Northern Ireland and Ireland. She is focusing on children with speech sound disorders.

Meeting Natalie and Jill via Skype