Milijana Buac, Ph.D., CCC-SLP

Title:	Associate Professor
Pronouns:	she/her/hers
Unit:	Speech-Language Pathology
Office Location:	Wirtz Hall 122L
Office Phone:	815-753-1521
Office Fax:	815-753-9123
Email:	mbuac@niu.edu

Courses Taught

• COMD 423: Developmental Speech and Language Disorder
• COMD 429: Assessment Procedures in Communicative Disorders
• COMD 601: Principles of Assessment in Communicative Disorders
• COMD 607: Language Disorders in School-age Populations
• COMD 611- Culturally and Linguistically Responsive Interventions in Speech-Language Pathology
• COMD 671: Speech Sound Disorders
• AHCD 610: Multicultural Aspects of Speech-Language Pathology
• AHCD 700: Portfolio for Multicultural Certificate in Speech-Language Pathology

Education

• Ph.D., University of Wisconsin-Madison, Communication Sciences and Disorders
• M.S., University of Wisconsin-Madison, Communicative Disorders
• B.S., Marquette University, Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology

Certification

Certification of Clinical Competence in Speech-Language Pathology, American Speech-Language Hearing Association

Licensure

State of Illinois, Speech-Language Pathology License

Research Interests

• Bilingual language development with a focus on environmental factors such as parental language input
• The impact of bilingualism on cognitive skills in children
• Evidence-based assessment and intervention approaches

Selected Publications

Wang, Z., Onal, S., Pandit, P., Gladfelter, A., & Buac, M. (2026). Accessible autism screening in children: a pilot study of markerless gait analysis from ordinary walking videos. International Journal of Developmental Disabilities, 1–15.

Buac, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2026). The Impact of Accented Input on Spanish-English Bilingual Children’s Word Learning. Behavioral Sciences, 16(6), 943.

Jarzynski, R. L. and Buac, M. (2025). Influences on Early Intervention Speech-Language Pathologists' Beliefs, Knowledge, and Practices for Assessing Dual Language Learners. Seminars in Speech and Language.

Ocampo, V. A., Buac, M., Cannone, A., O'Connor, S. and Gladfelter, A. (2025). Developing a Core Vocabulary List for Tagalog–English Bilingual Preschool-Age Children. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 1-15.

Jarzynski, R. and Buac, M. (2024). Early intervention speech-language pathologists' beliefs and practices related to assessing dual language learners. Journal of Communication Disorders, 112, 106470.

Buac, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2023). The Impact of non-native language input on bilingual children's language skills. Languages, 8(4), 277.

Buac, M., *Ibara, G., *Torres, R., Onal, S., Gladfelter, G. and Wang, Z. (2023). The urgent need for neuroscience research to consider culture when assessing the development of gait in autistic children: A scoping review. Journal of Integrative Neuroscience, 22(2), 51.

Buac, M. and *Jarzynski, R. (2022). Providing culturally and linguistically responsive language assessment services for multilingual children with developmental language disorder: a scoping review. Current Developmental Disorders Reports, 9(4), 204-212.

Buac, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (in press). The impact of non-native language input on bilingual children's language skills. Languages, 8(4), 277.

Buac, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2019). Predictors of theory of mind performance in bilingual and monolingual children. International Journal of Bilingualism.

Buac, M., Tauzin-Larché, A., Weisberg, E. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2018). Effects of speaker certainty on novel word learning in monolingual and bilingual children. Bilingualism: Language and Cognition, 1-13.

McDonald, M., Gross, M., Buac, M., Batko, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2017). Processing and comprehension of accented speech by monolingual and bilingual children. Language Learning and Development, 14(2), 113-129.

Buac, M., Gross, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2016). Predictors of processing-based task performance in bilingual and monolingual children. Journal of Communication Disorders, 62, 1229.

Buac, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2014). The relationship between linguistic and non-linguistic cognitive control skills in bilingual children from low socio-economic backgrounds. Frontiers in Psychology, 5 (article 1098), 1-12.

Buac, M., Gross, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2014). The role of home language environment in the development of monolingual and bilingual children's vocabulary skills. Journal of Speech, Language, and Hearing Research, 57, 1804-1816.

Gross, M., Buac, M. and Kaushanskaya, M. (2014). Conceptual scoring of receptive and expressive vocabulary measures in simultaneous and sequential bilingual children. American Journal of Speech-Language Pathology, 23(4), 574-586.

Kaushanskaya, M., Gross, M. and Buac, M. (2014). Effects of classroom bilingualism on task shifting, verbal memory, and word learning in children. Developmental Science, 4, 564-583.

Kaushanskaya, M., Gross, M. and Buac, M. (2013). Gender differences in child word learning. Learning and Individual Differences, 27, 82-89.