Real-Eval Studio
Description
REAL-EVAL Studio is a Vertically Integrated Projects team for students interested in communication, health, medicine, rehabilitation, technology, design, and real-world impact. The team focuses on developing digital and creative tools that support discourse assessment — the evaluation of connected communication, such as storytelling, conversation, and everyday explanations — for adults with language and communication disorders, including aphasia.
Students will help improve REAL-EVAL Studio’s user interface, expand its back-end with new discourse measures, test features, support research workflows, and participate in implementation activities that move the platform toward clinical and community use. The team will also help develop new discourse assessment materials that better reflect meaningful, everyday communication.
This work may involve students from speech-language pathology, cognitive science, pre-health and medicine, neuroscience, psychology, computer science, data science, human-centered design, illustration, digital art, and related fields. Together, REAL-EVAL Studio offers hands-on experience at the intersection of clinical research, rehabilitation science, health technology, software development, creative design, and translational health innovation, with the goal of making communication assessment more accessible, scalable, and useful for people with aphasia and related disorders.
Goals and Learning Outcomes
Students on this team will gain interdisciplinary research experience while contributing to the development of innovative digital tools and communication assessments for adults with aphasia and other communication disorders.
Learning Outcomes
- Understand how aphasia and other communication disorders affect everyday communication, health, and rehabilitation.
- Learn how discourse is assessed in clinical and research settings using connected communication tasks such as storytelling and conversation.
- Apply principles of clinical research, including research ethics, informed consent, HIPAA, privacy protections, and IRB protocols.
- Contribute to the design, testing, and implementation of digital health technologies, including REAL-EVAL Studio.
- Improve software usability, accessibility, research workflows, and communication assessment tools.
- Develop communication assessment materials that reflect meaningful, real-world interactions.
- Collaborate on interdisciplinary teams spanning clinical science, medicine, rehabilitation, software development, data analysis, design, and the creative arts.
- Strengthen skills in teamwork, communication, project management, problem-solving, documentation, usability testing, and translational research.
- Gain experience translating research into practical tools that support patients, clinicians, researchers, educators, and communities.
- Build a portfolio of applied research and development work, including software contributions, assessment materials, usability testing, presentations, and other project deliverables.
Majors and Schools Sought
Speech, Language and Hearing Sciences; Cognitive Science; Psychology; Neuroscience; Informatics; Computer Science; Data Science; Human-Centered Computing; Intelligent Systems Engineering; Public Health; Pre-Medicine/Pre-Health; Rehabilitation Sciences; Health Sciences; Human Biology; Medical Humanities; Linguistics; Media; Graphic Design; Illustration; Digital Art; Studio Art; Interactive and Digital Media; and related fields
Desired Skills and Interests
We welcome self-motivated, dependable, and collaborative students who are curious, organized, and eager to learn. Strong communication skills, attention to detail, creativity, and a willingness to work across disciplines are valued.
Students with interests in health, rehabilitation, communication disorders, neuroscience, psychology, clinical research, digital health, software development, data analysis, human-centered design, accessibility, or the creative arts are encouraged to apply. No specific technical background is required—just an interest in solving real-world problems and developing tools that improve communication and quality of life.