Welcome to our new website.  The Missouri Speech Language Hearing Association’s Executive Board and Membership are delighted you could visit.  Our goal when designing the website was to create a user friendly site full of information for everyone.  We hope you will explore all of its features.  Currently, we are developing a special section for the general public with answers to commonly asked speech, language and hearing questions.  The name and contact information for all Executive Board members is available should anyone require additional information or help.  As always, we encourage your positive input on ways to improve MSHA, including our website, the “Link”, and educational opportunities.

One of the most powerful forces in the world is communication.  Everyday millions of events happen: the world and people change and ideas are exchanged.  This is all due to  communication.  Just think for a moment how communication effects your daily life as you send your children to school and wish them a good day, check on an elderly person’s health, have the car washed, work as a team to develop an IEP for a student, give an oral presentation, wish your neighbor congratulations on the birth of a grandchild, or listen to a TV commentator speak about the credentials of a political candidate.  In reality, nothing happens in this world without some form of communication.

MSHA’s membership has dedicated their lives to working with this powerful force called communication.  The goal of the speech language pathologist and audiologist is to improve an individual’s communication skills to facilitate the exchange of ideas, make events happen, and change people’s lives.  How powerful and rewarding it is to help a stroke patient tell their spouse, “I Love You” or to help a hearing impaired child excel in school!

I first started my work in communication as a speech therapy student in 1969 at Bowling Green State University, Bowling Green, Ohio.  Since then, my studies have taken me to the State University of New York at Brockport, the Jordan Hill School of Education in Scotland, Hofstra University on Long Island, The University of Missouri, St. Louis, and The University of Florida, Gainsville.  Forty two years later I find myself a clinical audiologist in private practice working with the hearing impaired.  Now more than ever, I appreciate the power of communication and what it means to all of us.  With the help and support of our membership and dedicated Executive Board, my goal is to make our state organization a powerful force as well.     



Gil Phon, Aud, CCC-A, FAAA
President, Missouri Speech-Language-Hearing Association
glphon@aol.com