Hello everyone, my name is Voon Pang and I have been blogging for the Stuttering Foundation since August of this year. I am a Speech Language Pathologist working for the Stuttering Treatment and Research Trust in Auckland, New Zealand. Prior to writing for the SFA, I had no experience in blogging (disclaimer – check!) though I have an interest in social media and running a group forum for SLPs. I feel very privileged to be part of the SFA family even though I’m about 8,000 miles away and 19 hours ahead of the main headquarters. Jane Fraser and the team have been amazing in supporting me in this endeavour, and as with learning anything new, it will take a while for me to find my feet but in the meantime I hope that I’m doing an OK job for you all.
 
A bit about me… I graduated from Curtin University in Perth, Western Australia at the end of 2006 with a degree in human communication science (or speech language pathology). Since graduating, my passion and interest in stuttering has taken me to various places around the world.  I was fortunate enough to attend a SFA training workshop in 2009 in Boston at Boston University (and again in 2011), which is where I met Jane. In 2010, I visited the Michael Palin Centre for Stammering Children in London and am due to visit again in the summer of 2013. This year, I was able to experience my first American camp and attended Camp Shout Out in Muskegon, Michigan! There have been many colleagues and clients, past and present, who have influenced my thinking around stuttering. Without the foot-in-the-door experience of the first SFA workshop, I’d doubt that I would be where I am today. 
 
The blog is my way of ‘giving back’ and providing a voice to those who stutter. I hope you will continue to follow my journey and join in at stutteringhelp.org/blog. 
 
Check it out every now and then, leave a comment or two and let the Stuttering Foundation know if you would like me to write a piece on a particular topic.
 
Until next time,
Voon
 
From the 2013 Winter Newsletter