After 35 years, Dr. George Mencher has retired from active involvement in the School of Human Communication Disorders (SHCD).  Dr. Mencher served as Director of the Nova Scotia Hearing and Speech Centres from 1973 until 1998 and was instrumental in founding the SHCD.  He has contributed in many ways to the School over these past 35 years, not the least of which was teaching a course in Hearing Disorders to every class of students admitted to the School.  Interestingly, this year – his last year of teaching – the class included the son of an audiologist who was a student in the School’s first class.

Despite his retirement from the NSHSC and the School, Dr. Mencher remains active in international work in audiology.  Over the course of his professional life, he has worked as a volunteer professional in many countries, particularly in Latin America, to develop programs, train personnel, and provide services, and continues to do so.  He has been an active participant in the International Society of Audiology, having served as President and Past-President and is currently serving as Secretary-General.  He is a widely published researcher of many scholarly articles and eight books which include the highly regarded Early Identification of Hearing Loss, International Perspectives of Communication Disorders, and Auditory Dysfunction.

One of Dr. Mencher’s international colleagues has described him as “one of the most constructively active members of our profession over the period of its growth and maturation in the last half of the 20th century and in the present.”  The SHCD is fortunate to have benefited from Dr. Mencher’s contributions these past 35 years and gratefully acknowledges his dedication and commitment to our programs and our students.