August 12, 2025 | Erin Bluvas, bluvase@sc.edu

Samantha Feeney’s path to becoming a speech-language pathologist can be traced back to two major events that took place during her teen years. When she was 14, her family adopted Feeney’s younger sister, who, at 18 months, was not speaking very much.

“We had a home health speech therapist come into the house to work with her and she made the most amazing progress,” the Boston native says. “That speech therapist changed all of our lives by helping my sister to communicate, and I decided then that I wanted to change lives like that too.”

Around this time, Feeney herself was diagnosed with a communication disorder – sensorineural hearing loss – for which she wears bilateral hearing aids. Prior to her treatment, she had experienced extreme anxiety in academic contexts, believing that she wasn’t as smart as others when she just couldn’t hear the same messages they were receiving.

“This experience is what really fueled my passion to pursue hearing loss as a specialty,” Feeney says. “I know what it’s like to be that kid that is struggling and doesn’t understand why, and I want to be that person who helps them to do and be their best.”

During her time as an undergraduate at USC, the Top Scholar student made the most of USC’s vast resources. As someone who was diagnosed with a learning disability in elementary school, she thrived in the Honors Colleges’ small class sizes and utilized the services and support offered by the Student Disability Resource Center, student success center, peer tutoring and faculty office hours. She found fun and stress relief as a member of USC’s Ballroom Dancing Club.

Feeney chose public health as her major and minored in French, a language she was already fluent in thanks to her high school coursework. She put these skills to use junior year when she joined Lisa Fitton’s Bilingual Reading Difficulty Identification Lab, where the Department of Communication Sciences and Disorders (COMD) associate professor researches ways to improve educational outcomes for children from diverse backgrounds, particularly bilingual elementary-aged students.

“Dr. Fitton’s knowledge base for literacy and bilingualism is enormous, and she is always excited to discuss it and pass on her knowledge to others,” says Feeney, who stayed on as a graduate research assistant when she enrolled in the M.S. in Speech-Language Pathology program after her 2023 graduation. “She was the director for my undergraduate honors thesis – encouraging me combine my own interests with the work we were doing in the lab. Dr. Fitton by far made the most impact on my six years at USC.”

She also found a mentor in COMD assistant professor Meisam Arjmandi, who taught Feeney’s Speech Science and Acoustic Measurement course by breaking down the complex subject into easy-to-understand concepts. She also enjoyed learning about his research on cochlear implants, which fit with her interests in working with populations who have hearing loss.

The program’s Auditory Verbal Therapy special interest track also boosted Feeney’s knowledge of this area and helped her secure a Clinical Fellowship with Spartanburg Regional Medical Center, which begins following her August graduation. This fellowship includes training required to become an Auditory Verbal Therapist, a certification offered by the Alexander Graham Bell Academy that takes 3-5 years to complete. 

“My one big piece of advice is to trust in your preparation and the faculty around you,” says Feeney, who received the department's M.S. Residential Outstanding Student Award. “I had the honor of having an amazing research mentor as an undergraduate who really helped me better understand the profession and the process of applying to and beginning graduate school. Do the research that you need to do to understand what you’re getting into: know what programs are available near you, the requirements for admission, etc. Preparation is much more useful than anxiety.”

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