通讯科学与障碍专业旨在为学生提供专业的准备，这对于从事语言病理学或听力学学的研究生工作至关重要。要担任语言病理学家或听力学家，必须具有硕士学位或博士学位。这些人作为专业人员来协助有沟通障碍的人，大学中的教师，临床主管和/或研究人员，医疗保健或教育环境中的行政人员和领导人。为了更深入地了解人类如何交流以及可能干扰其交流的问题，研究必不可少。该专业鼓励学生参与研究，为他们提供从事荣誉项目和荣誉论文的机会，并鼓励学生参加地区和国家会议并与学生的导师一起介绍他们的研究工作。
The communication sciences and disorders major is designed to provide students with pre-professional preparation essential to pursuing graduate work in speech-language pathology or audiology. Graduate degrees at the masters or doctoral level are necessary to work as speech-language pathologists or audiologists. These individuals work as professionals to assist people who have communication disorders, teachers, clinical supervisors and/or researchers in universities, administrators and leaders in healthcare or educational settings. Research is essential in order to understand more about how humans communicate and the problems that can interfere with their communication. The major encourages students to become involved in research, provides them with opportunities to pursue honors projects and honors theses, and encourages students to attend and present their research work with the student's faculty mentor at regional and national conferences.