Two generations of the Fegley family have now benefitted from enrolling in the Language-Learning Early Advantage Program

When Hannah Fegley’s son—Adrien, 2—was 12 months old, she noticed that his speech and language development were delayed. The family began working with the Montgomery County Infants and Toddlers Program, but they eventually made the decision to explore other options, believing that Adrien would benefit from a more intensive speech therapy program.

Hannah knew just who to reach out to: The Language-Learning Early Advantage Program (LEAP) Preschool located within the University of Maryland’s Department of Hearing and Speech Sciences’ (HESP) Hearing and Speech Clinic.

Hannah already knew about LEAP because her younger brother, David, was a part of LEAP’s first graduating class.

Newspaper clipping with the headline “UM program helps children be seen and heard,” featuring a black-and-white photo of a young LEAP graduate in a cap holding a diploma. The article describes the University of Maryland’s Language-Learning Early Advantage Program and highlights its support for children with speech and language challenges.

“He was unintelligible; he talked a lot, but no one could understand him,” Hannah recalled with a laugh. “LEAP made a big difference for my brother, and it was hugely helpful for our family.”

David—who is now a lawyer, and married to an elementary school teacher who is herself a Terp alumna—went to LEAP to work on challenges he was having with pronunciation.

Adrien has been working with LEAP toward different speech and language goals, including understanding prepositions, producing two-word utterances, and accurately saying vowel-consonant words.

Hannah says that Adrien “adores” the time he gets to spend one-on-one with his speech therapist, Casey Strauss, a 2027 Speech-Language Pathology master’s degree candidate in HESP.

A young child wearing glasses plays with a colorful toy ramp while an adult seated on the floor engages with him in a classroom or therapy setting. A whiteboard is mounted on the wall nearby.

“We target all of Adrien’s goals through child-led play,” Strauss said. “As we play, I model relevant phrases using two words, and we practice correctly articulating the sounds in many of the prepositions. He has been making excellent progress towards his goals, and he is so fun to work with. He brings everyone so much joy with his smiles and excitement.”

Despite Adrien only having been with LEAP for roughly two months so far, Hannah can already see its positive impact.

“There are way more attempts to communicate verbally than there was before, Adrien’s speaking way more clearly, and his vocabulary is increasing. When he first came to LEAP, he was primarily just using one word at a time to communicate, occasionally two. Now he’s frequently speaking and putting two or even three words together, and you can see him really trying to get his mouth and tongue in the right place to make certain sounds,” she said. “In a short time, we have seen a huge difference.”

Adrien’s experience with LEAP takes his grandmother, Stacey Katz, back to when David was a LEAP student.

“When I joined my daughter in the observation room watching Adrien learn how to say new words, I cried. It brought me back over 30 years ago to when David was in that very same room learning sounds he had never developed as a toddler,” Katz recalled. “I know Adrien will be fine, thanks to LEAP. Not only did his uncle learn to pronounce words, but he grew up to be an outstanding public speaker and communicator.

“One-on-one speech therapy, three times per week within a nursery school setting, staffed by such expert and enthusiastic graduate students is the best model I can imagine and we are so lucky it is right here in College Park,” she added. “I have such immense gratitude for the LEAP program and its lifelong impact on our family.”

The Fegley family is so grateful for LEAP, Hannah, her father and Adrien attended a public meeting before the Council on Academic Accreditation reviewers—who were deciding on whether to recertify HESP’s clinical audiology and speech-language pathology graduate programs—to share about the program’s positive impact earlier this year.

Adrien’s favorite part of the day was enjoying the South Campus Dining Hall’s warm chocolate chip cookies afterward.

A young child wearing blue glasses and a light blue bib that reads “Lil Hangry” stands in a busy dining hall while eating a cookie. The child is dressed in a gray-and-white striped shirt and tan pants. People walk in the background under string lights and hanging signs, creating a lively indoor food court atmosphere.

“Knowing that LEAP is supporting multiple generations is a powerful reminder that this work extends far beyond the classroom. It lives on in families and in the lasting impact of being seen and supported,” said Courtney Overton, LEAP director and an assistant clinical professor in HESP.

Learn more about LEAP!

 

This post is originally from the BSOS website. 

Side-by-side image showing a child at two different stages: on the left, a black-and-white childhood photo of a young boy in a graduation cap holding a certificate; on the right, a recent color photo of a young child wearing glasses and a plaid shirt, standing beside a sign that reads “To LEAP.”