ASHA Announces 2024 Media Champion Award Recipients

(Rockville, MD) The American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA) announced the recipients of ASHA’s 2024 Media Champion Awards today, which recognize media outlets, ASHA members, and others for outstanding coverage and outreach about communication disorders and the work of audiologists and speech-language pathologists.

“Communication challenges can go untreated and worsen when the public doesn’t know how they can be addressed,” said 2024 ASHA President Tena L. McNamara, AuD, CCC-A/SLP. “We applaud this year’s Media Champion Award honorees for informing individuals and families on how they can identify communication disorders and get treatment for them.” She added: “We also want to salute the continual initiative, proactivity, and impact of this year’s ASHA member honorees. They are tremendous media engagement models for all of us.” 

ASHA’s 2024 Media Champion Award recipients are:

NPR: For the segments “Baby babble isn't just goo goo! And hearing 2 languages is better than one,” broadcast on September 15, 2023, and “Do you have “TikTok voice”? It’s OK if you don’t want to get rid of it”, broadcast February 1, 2024. NPR spoke with ASHA staff and members for insights about how speech and language skills develop in infants—and the vocal style of social media influencers.

Raising Healthy Kid Brains: For the podcast episode “How to Support Your Child’s Speech Development,” published February 22, 2024. Podcast host Amy Nielson provided an in-depth look at ASHA’s development milestones for communication.

Today.com: For the articles “Why do babies say Dada first?,” by Elise Solé, published on May 24, 2024, and “What is gender-affirming vocal care? The medical field helping trans and nonbinary people find their voice,” by Caroline Kee, published June 24, 2024. Today.com quoted ASHA staff and members who provided a deeper look into a child’s first words—and a primer on gender-affirming voice services.

Rare Parenting: For the articles “Why Does My Non-Verbal Child Need Speech Therapy?,” by Stephanie Watson, published on April 24, 2024, and “What Are Communication Devices for Non-Verbal Children?” by Stephanie Watson, published on May 2, 2024. The outlet interviewed ASHA staff to provide information on helping non-speaking children to communicate and the services of speech-language pathologists.

American Urban Radio Networks: For its syndicated coverage of new polling by ASHA and the World Health Organization (WHO) that shows that video gamers, who are at risk for hearing loss, are willing to take measures to protect their hearing. The polling has helped inform WHO’s efforts to develop the first-ever global safe listening standard for video game play.

Marsha Pinto, MS, CCC- SLP: For extensive media outreach that includes interviews with San Francisco–area television outlets about topics such as autism and how electronics usage among children can affect language skills. 

Stephanie Cohen, MA, CCC-SLP: For providing insight and guidance about childhood communication and feeding development through national and local media interviews with outlets including WGN News in Chicago and Today.com—as well as her online platform with a large following of parents.

Alexandra M. Camacho-Luna, ScD, CCC-A: For continuous media outreach with Spanish-language media outlets—including Univision, the largest Spanish-language network in the United States—highlighting the importance of hearing health and how to address hearing difficulties.

Janice Trent, AuD, CCC-A: For her continued and many years of broadcast interviews about hearing protection in the Washington, DC, area and beyond, which has earned her more ASHA Media Champion Awards than anyone else. Recently, Trent was interviewed for an article in Hearing Life magazine and for a segment on the This Week in Hearing podcast.

Jamila Minga, PhD, CCC-SLP: For co-producing the documentary, RHD: Hidden Diagnosis, which aired on PBS and on local public broadcasting networks. The film highlights the little-known issue of right hemisphere brain damage and features people who have sought treatment for it after having a stroke. The documentary showcases the work of speech-language pathologists in helping these individuals to communicate more effectively.

About the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association (ASHA)
ASHA is the national professional, scientific, and credentialing association for 234,000 members and affiliates who are audiologists; speech-language pathologists; speech, language, and hearing scientists; audiology and speech-language pathology assistants; and students. Audiologists specialize in preventing and assessing hearing and balance disorders as well as providing audiologic treatment, including hearing aids. Speech-language pathologists (SLPs) identify, assess, and treat speech, language, and swallowing disorders.