Trine University and Turnstone Center for Children and Adults with Disabilities will partner to serve and empower people with communication impairments through a collaboration on Turnstone's campus that will feature a speech-language therapy clinic serving clients and providing Trine students in a new graduate degree program with a site for clinical experiences.

The clinic will be located on Turnstone's Fort Wayne campus at 3320 N. Clinton St and will support the new Trine Master of Science in speech-language pathology degree that is expected to launch in the Fall of 2022. Plans for the collaboration include a clinical experience for students, in addition to classrooms, offices, training, and lab space. Plans are expected to be completed by the end of July 2022.

Chanda Lichtsinn, director of rehabilitation therapy and speech language pathologist for Turnstone, will serve as program director for Trine's speech-language pathology program. Turnstone speech language pathologists also will serve as practicum instructors with future plans of clinical faculty practicing at the speech therapy clinic and treating participating Turnstone clients.

In addition to the robust clinical experience offered at Turnstone, Trine students will complete practicums at Fort Wayne-area hospitals, skilled nursing facilities, school-based programs and other sites.

Trine University also plans to launch a bachelor of science in communication disorders on its Angola main campus, which will provide a direct entry pathway to the Master of Science in speech language pathology degree.

Trine announced plans to launch a Master of Science in speech-language pathology program in 2018 as part of a broader strategy to expand its health sciences programs in Fort Wayne. The graduate program will join Trine's existing Doctor of Physical Therapy, Master of Physician Assistant Studies and Associate of Science in surgical technology, which are based at the university's Fort Wayne Center for Health Sciences on the Parkview Randallia campus.