Creative Speech Solutions Staff

Director

Cynthia Marrapodi, M.S., CCC-SLP

Cynthia received her Bachelor of Science degree in Speech Pathology and Audiology from Ithaca College, with a minor in psychology, in 1988; and her Master of Science degree in Speech Pathology from Columbia University in 1990. Cynthia is certified by the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association and licensed by the state of New Jersey.

Cynthia has been interested in the area of feeding disorders since early on in her career and has taken extensive coursework in this area, including Suzanne Evan Morris’s six-day training program. She has also attended conferences with Justine Joan Sheppard on the subject of neuromuscular feeding disorders as well as various feeding courses with Lori Overland.

Cynthia was first employed as a speech-language pathologist at Saint Barnabas Medical Center where she worked in the neonatal intensive care unit helping young infants transition to oral feedings. During this time, she also had the opportunity to be part of the cleft palate team working with and establishing plans for children with a wide range of craniofacial disorders. In addition, she was part of the team of physicians and therapists who conducted the first videofluroscopic swallow studies at Saint Barnabas.

In 1993 Cynthia began a private practice. She initially treated both children and adults, but then began to focus primarily on treatment of pediatrics. During the early years of her private practice, Cynthia was an independent consultant for St. Joseph’s School for the Blind, where she worked closely with occupational and physical therapists to plan and implement oral-motor feeding programs for the children attending St. Joseph’s. In addition, Cynthia trained other professionals and parents to implement these programs during lunch, therapeutic snacks, and at home for carry-over. Cynthia was also contracted by the Millburn duel sensory impaired Early Intervention Program to treat children with extensive feeding, speech, language, and global developmental delays. She served as the program coordinator during much of this time. Cynthia enjoyed holding meetings to train and educate parents regarding specific therapeutic techniques they could use at home to help their children. While providing Early Intervention services, Cynthia coordinated with occupational therapists, physical therapists, social workers, and learning consultants.

During the early years of her private practice, Cynthia was exposed to many children with motor speech disorders, including apraxia of speech. She therefore began attending various conferences and training seminars with experts in the field such as Sara Rosenfeld-Johnson, Edyth Strand, and Pamela Marshalla. She has also trained extensively in PROMPT (Prompts for Restructuring Oral Muscular Phonetic Targets). Over the years, Cynthia has also taken many other courses on topics such as auditory processing, nutrition, myofunctional swallowing, and sensory integration dysfunction. She provides parents with extensive reports and program plans to present to their school districts to help in planning the most appropriate individualized program for their child. She is well versed with insurance terminology and has assisted many families in the appeal process so they can maximize their benefit parameters.

Cynthia is committed to providing the best service to each child that she treats. She takes pride in the role she plays in helping children reach their maximum potential. She is proud of the committed and talented therapists who work for her. She enjoys working with them, teaching them, and learning from them. Cynthia is excited about the additional services that are now available at Creative Speech Solutions, LLC. She remains committed to providing only the highest quality of care at her expanded facility. As always, she will work hard to continually improve the services provided and to offer opportunities for her associates to attend continuing education courses so they can become even better therapists.

Cynthia has three lovely daughters and a very patient husband who is proud and supportive of her accomplishments (i.e., juggling act) as a mother, therapist and business owner.