Marie Cocquyt

Marie Cocquyt received training and education as a Bachelor in Speech Therapy and Audiology and a Master degree in Speech Language and Hearing Sciences (Ghent University). Since 2012 she is a researcher at Vrije Universiteit Brussel and assigned as PhD researcher at the Mental Health & Wellbeing Research Group since 2018. Her PhD research focuses on early logopaedic intervention avoiding speech and language problems in children with cleft lip and palate. She developed an intervention programme (parent implemented) and a screening instrument called ‘EPVs: lijsten voor Evaluatie van Pragmatische Vaardigheden (lists for evaluation of pragmatic skills) - for the early detection of children at risk for communication problems’, published in 2010 by Sig vzw (Cocquyt & Zink, 2010). During the research of the quality of the EPVs (psychometric tests) she was co-promotor of 8 Master students of Catholic University Louvain and published the results in an international journal (Cocquyt et al., 2015).

Besides her experiences as a researcher, she also has a long track record as a speech therapist in a Rehabilitation Centre, her private practice and several teams for Cleft & craniofacial anomalies. She also worked as a project leader of three projects on ‘Pre-school childcare for children with disabilities in typical Brussels daycare centres’ and several customised projects for organisations providing care for children between 0 and 3 years. She also worked as a practical assistant in the specific teacher education at Ghent University. From 2000 (till now) she is lecturer in speech therapy at Hogeschool Gent (University College Ghent), giving courses in the field of Craniofacial disorders, Observation, Prevention and Early Intervention and Research. At the University College Ghent she received funding and a partial exemption from teaching duties to work on the research in 3 PWO projects: 2011-2014, 2014-2016 and 2017-2020.