Dr Bill Keith QSO PhD MNZAS

Director

Dr Bill Keith is an audiologist with over fifty years public and private sector experience.

Bill was Principal Audiologist, National Audiology Centre, Department of Health, and was involved in establishing many hearing services and policies in New Zealand including the University of Auckland School of Medicine audiology training programme and New Zealand's first cochlear implant service. He has continued to consult on various national hearing policy issues.

He established the hearing aid company Phonak New Zealand Ltd (a subsidiary of the Swiss Sonova group) in New Zealand and managed it for eighteen years, earning a number of business awards during that time.

Bill has carried out hearing research in New Zealand and the United States. He is also the inventor of an automated paediatric audiometer that was manufactured and exported from New Zealand for a number of years.

With Phonak colleagues Bill was closely involved with Team New Zealand for over ten years in the development of specialised on-board crew communication systems for their Americas Cup yachts.

Bill has been awarded the honour of Companion of the Queen's Service Order for Public Service, a Fulbright Travel Award for his graduate studies at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas, and Life Memberships of the NZ Audiological Society and the Hearing Association, Auckland Branch. In 2011 he was awarded the International Award in Hearing by the American Academy of Audiology. AAA Award William Keith

Over the past fifty years Bill has served on numerous health, research, deafness, professional, business and voluntary organisation committees and Boards. He chaired the Northern Cochlear Implant Trust which manages government-funded cochlear implant services and was Deputy Chair of the associated Pindrop Foundation. He served on the Board of the Abilities Foundation Charitable Trust, the National Steering Team for Universal Newborn Hearing Screening (Project HIEDI), and the Scientific Committee and Board of the Deafness Research Foundation. He is also a Past National President of the Hearing Association and is on the Board of the Hearing Association, Auckland.

Bill currently runs SoundSkills, a specialist clinic for children and adults with auditory processing disorder (APD), which he has established to redress the lack of APD services in New Zealand; and carries out APD teaching and research at the University of Auckland.

Janene Houghton MA DipAud

Audiologist

Janene Houghton is an audiologist with considerable and varied experience in her professional career. This has included general clinical practice within the Auckland District Health Board and private audiological work while living in Hong Kong for 14 years, where her roles included clinical tutor in the Hearing and Speech Sciences programme and Senior Research Assistant at the University of Hong Kong. She established a neonatal hearing screening programme as part of a joint research and clinical services development project between the University and the Hong Kong Adventist Hospital at which facility she was also instrumental in setting up a private audiology clinic.

Janene developed a special interest in APD upon her return to New Zealand and has worked in the area of auditory processing for the past 11 years. This includes a specialist APD clinical role at the University of Auckland Hearing and Tinnitus Clinics and tutoring students from the Master of Audiology Programme in APD clinical practice.

Janene continues to support specialised APD educational and clinical initiatives for audiology students and has a particular interest in the benefits of active musical training for auditory processing, enjoying her own involvement with a cappella singing.

Janene embraced the opportunity to take her diagnostic skills into developing further specialised APD services at SoundSkills and enjoys working collaboratively with our multi-disciplinary team to help children and clients overcome challenges.

Joanna Wallace MAud, MNZAS, CCC

Audiologist

Joanna Wallace is an audiologist with specialised skills for assessing and treating those with auditory processing difficulties. Joanna has a strong interest in enabling children to meet their potential.

Joanna has experience working with children of all ages and abilities. She has worked extensively in the areas of diagnosis and rehabilitation in the public and private audiology sectors. She has a Master of Audiology degree with first class honours.

Joanna has worked alongside ENT specialists, paediatricians, speech-language therapists and Ministry of Education Advisers on Deaf Children. She has a particular interest in working with children diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder, behavioural concerns, and those with specific learning difficulties.

Joanna is a member of the New Zealand Audiological Society and holds a current practising certificate. She is a registered ACC provider.

Currently Joanna enjoys working collaboratively with children and their whānau, helping children to overcome barriers to learning by better understanding their individual needs.

Jenny Coutts Dip Tchg, BEd, Grad Dip Lit Ed

Education Adviser

Jenny Coutts is an Education Adviser at SoundSkills. She specialises primarily in supporting children with auditory processing disorder in the classroom. Jenny works alongside children, parents and caregivers, Learning Support Coordinators, Special Education Needs Coordinators, and teachers to provide guidance and advice on the use, management and trialling of amplification systems for APD, and strategies to support the student.

Jenny has more than 30 years’ experience as a primary school teacher, the last six years of which she served as Deputy Principal and Special Education Needs Coordinator for her school. As a Special Education Needs Coordinator, Jenny was responsible for services and care for all children with sensory, learning, and behavioural challenges in the school. Previously, Jenny had trained as a Resource Teacher for Literacy, assisting children with reading difficulties. Jenny has undertaken additional special training in the management of auditory processing disorder.

Jenny has always had a passion for helping children meet their potential. Jenny enjoys working alongside the other team members at SoundSkills in supporting the children who come to us, and their families.

Karen Blackall PGDip Ed – Learning and Behaviour, B A, Dip Tchg Hearing Impaired, Dip Tchg

Education Adviser

Karen Blackall is an Education Adviser. She seeks to ensure that the parents, SENCos and teachers of SoundSkills’ child clients have a better understanding of APD and its impacts on learning. She provides advice and guidance on the use of Remote Microphone Hearing Aid (RMHA) systems, the funding eligibility criteria and the trial process. Karen is the link between SoundSkills’ clinic and the school, ensuring optimal learning opportunities for students.

Karen has over 30 years’ experience in the education sector, having held a range of teaching positions that are specialised in nature such as Resource Teacher, Learning and Behaviour (RTLB); and Resource Teacher, Deaf (RTD). She has held leadership positions within schools, working across the primary, intermediate, secondary, and tertiary education sectors. Karen has worked alongside students, parents, and teachers to collaboratively devise interventions to meet students’ individual needs – adapting class-based programmes, scaffolding learning, and using Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles to promote inclusion.

Karen has presented at conferences and facilitates professional learning for schools in a variety of areas including sensory, learning and behaviour challenges.

Karen enjoys working collaboratively as part of multidisciplinary team both at SoundSkills and within schools to ensure that students reach their learning potential.

Sarah Lawton GradDip: Psych, MSLT(Hons), MNZSTA

Speech-Language Therapist (SLT) - Consultant

Sarah Lawton is a speech-language therapist with specialist skills in promoting change in young people with auditory processing disorder and literacy difficulties.

Sarah has extensive experience working with complex communication and learning challenges. She has a Master of Speech Language Therapy Practice degree (first class honours) and a Graduate Diploma in Psychology. Her thesis on APD has been published.

Sarah is a qualified Sounds-WriteTM Practitioner. The Sounds-WriteTM programme is a gold standard phonics programme to teach and remediate reading and spelling. Sarah is a certified member of the New Zealand Speech-language Therapists' Association.

Sarah is a consultant at SoundSkills. Sarah is available for Speech-Language assessments, intervention/programme strategies, advice and guidance.

Sarah runs her own practice in South Auckland. SoundSkills can also refer families to other Speech Language Therapists for therapy.

Dr Joan Leung PhD

Specialist Adviser and Research Fellow: ASD and APD

Dr Joan Leung is a Specialist Adviser and Researcher: ASD and APD at SoundSkills. She is also a post-doctoral researcher at the School of Psychology in the University of Auckland.

Joan has extensive research experience that spans many fields, but primarily in the hearing sciences, and with a special interest in neurodevelopmental disorders and in particular autism. For her doctoral research, Joan helped autistic children improve their speech perception and social communication by providing auditory training plus hearing amplification with remote-microphone hearing systems.

Joan currently splits her time between working at SoundSkills, and on various research projects based at the Universities of Auckland and Otago. She also teaches undergraduate and postgraduate Psychology courses, as well as some modules for the Master of Speech-Language Therapy Practice programme at the University of Auckland.

Joan finds it very rewarding to work alongside the clinicians at SoundSkills with an aim to better serve their ever-expanding and diversifying client base, including children with more severe challenges.

Sam Marsh

Reception and Administration

Sam Marsh is a Clinic Administrator. She enjoys interacting with clients and their families.

Sam has worked in various administration roles prior to joining SoundSkills in 2011, including working as a school administrator and volunteering for Riding for the Disabled at Ambury Park helping with the riders, and also assisting their administration team.

Analysing information and data for APD research is Sam’s speciality. She is skilled at matching SoundSkills services to client needs and responding to queries from the SoundSkills website. Sam is also responsible for the account management with clients at SoundSkills.

Sam finds it very rewarding to see how SoundSkills can assist clients to be the best they can be.

Sandra Olliff

Reception and Administration

Sandra Olliff is one of the Clinic Administrators. She enjoys fostering relationships with all SoundSkills clients.

She has worked in HR, Sales, and Service Administration, but it is her experience in the primary school sector as an administrator for 11 years that is especially helpful when assisting families.

Sandra prioritises the client’s needs at SoundSkills, selects which SoundSkills services best meet a client’s requirements, responds to queries, and problem solves any issues with equipment to ensure that client experience at SoundSkills is always a positive one.

Sandra enjoys the role of coordinating all the services and personnel at SoundSkills.