Rate My Professor Karen Kochis-Jennings

Karen Kochis-Jennings served as a Professor in the Department of Communication Disorders and Sciences at California State University, Northridge. She earned a Ph.D. in Speech and Hearing Science from the University of Iowa, an M.A. in Communicative Disorders from California State University, Fullerton, and a degree in vocal performance from Berklee College of Music. She holds the Certificate of Clinical Competence in Speech-Language Pathology (CCC-SLP). With more than 16 years of clinical practice in voice assessment and therapy in private practice and at the Cedars-Sinai Voice and Swallowing Clinic, she accumulated over 30 years of vocal pedagogy experience. From 2004 to 2015, she worked as a Speech Pathologist in the Outpatient Voice and Swallowing Clinic at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, specializing in singing and performance voice rehabilitation. At CSUN, she began as Associate Professor in 2007 and advanced to Professor, teaching graduate courses including CDS 661: Voice and Disorders of Voice and CDS 558: Neuroanatomy and Neurophysiology of Speech, Language and Hearing, as well as supervising graduate student clinicians in the CSUN Voice Clinic. Her clinical experience encompassed treating patients with aphasias and motor speech disorders in outpatient settings.

Dr. Kochis-Jennings's research focused on laryngeal muscle activity during singing, utilizing electromyographic measurements in her doctoral work. Her key publications include "Laryngeal Muscle Activity and Vocal Fold Adduction During Chest, Chestmix, Headmix, and Head Registers in Females" (Journal of Voice, 2012) and "Cricothyroid Muscle and Thyroarytenoid Muscle Dominance in Vocal Register Control: Preliminary Results" (2014). She possesses expertise in perceptual and instrumental voice assessment, such as videostroboscopy, acoustic and aerodynamic voice analysis, and voice therapy for professional performance voice and transgender voice training. Her academic interests extended to foundational sciences like speech acoustics, anatomy, physiology, neuroanatomy, and neurophysiology, particularly the effects of neurological conditions including Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, aphasia, and apraxia of speech on speech, language, and swallowing. She served as president of the Southern California Chapter of the Voice Foundation since 2016 and acted as liaison for the CSUN Alumni Association, CDS Chapter, Speech-Language Pathology. After 18 years at CSUN, she retired in 2025.