Syracuse University is partnering with the University of Northern Iowa and Inclusion Connection to hold a conference on a scientifically discredited communication method this week, drawing criticism from academics and clinicians nationwide.

The Midwest Summer Institute, a two-day conference on facilitated communication, begins Monday on the UNI campus. More than 30 professors, speech pathologists and other professionals from organizations such as Harvard Medical School, Johns Hopkins University and the United States Air Force Academy have urged UNI to cancel the conference.

FC is a scientifically discredited communication method that originated at SU and has since spread to other parts of the country. Its advocates say the method allows nonverbal people to communicate by typing words on a device, such as a keyboard, with the help of an aide who holds a “user’s” arm, finger or shoulder as the user points to letters or types out messages. Scientific testing has indicated, though, that aides can unknowingly control the words typed by the user.

Organizations such as the New York State Department of Health, the American Psychological Association and the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry have acknowledged that FC is not a scientifically valid communication method.

“We do not question here the good intentions of FC facilitators, but at the same time, decades of harm from unvalidated mental health and developmental disabilities practices have taught us that good intentions are no guarantee of sound treatment and ethical practices,” the professors and clinicians said in a letter to Gaëtane Jean-Marie, dean of UNI’s College of Education, dated May 15.

Here is the letter a group of more than 30 professors, speech pathologists and other professionals sent to the dean of the University of Northern Iowa’s College of Education, urging UNI to cancel the conference: pic.twitter.com/cCSHETCdPb

— Jordan Muller (@jordanmuller18) June 18, 2018

SU’s Institute for Communication and Inclusion, which researches and promotes FC, maintains that the controversial method is effective in helping people with highly impaired speech communicate. Christine Ashby, director of the ICI, said she is disappointed when faculty attack FC without looking at it with intellectual curiosity.

“I welcome folks who are interested in having a conversation or a research-based discussion about this method of communication,” Ashby said. “But I’m disturbed when folks just position themselves sort of in opposition to opportunities like this for families.”

The UNI conference comes about three months after Anna Stubblefield, a former Rutgers University professor trained in FC at SU, pleaded guilty to the charge of criminal sexual contact with a man who has cerebral palsy. Stubblefield had maintained she received consent from the man by communicating with him using FC, but later acknowledged the man could not legally agree to sexual contact.

There have also been at least five dozen cases of children accusing their parents of sexual abuse through FC before 1995, but “the substantial majority” of accusations were unfounded, according to Emory University research.

Among the speakers at this week’s UNI event is Marilyn Chadwick, a speech and language pathologist at the ICI. She told an Iowa newspaper this week that no form of communication is perfect, but the benefits of FC outweigh the risks.

“I have seen over and over and over again a person’s life change because he’s able to communicate,” Chadwick told The Gazette.

The UNI FC conference is currently in its fifth year. This year’s two-day event, which requires a $250 fee, will include FC panels and other speakers, according to its website.

The group of academics and professionals said in a statement that UNI received the letter but did not respond to a request for a meeting with senior university representatives. Ashby said she believes UNI leadership is aware of the event and is in support of it.

UNI did not respond to a request for comment on this story.

SU is hosting its own FC introductory workshop on campus in October.

Published on June 17, 2018 at 10:53 pm

Contact Jordan: jmulle01@syr.edu | @jordanmuller18