Science Alumni Spotlight: Peter Adamson

Peter Adamson (Au.D. ’10) is a proud alumnus of the CUNY Graduate Center. Today he calls New York City home, but he hails from Parkersburg, Iowa — a town so small it could fit inside his current apartment building. He graduated from the University of Northern Iowa in 1993 with a B.A. in psychology and significant coursework in music, Spanish, and theater. He left Iowa for Missouri for an M.A. in counseling psychology at Truman State University in 1997. From there, he continued his midwestern adventures at Ball State University, working for several years as a college student administrator.

His dream of living in New York City came true in 2000 when he accepted a job at New York University, responsible for the NYU dormitories below Canal Street. Little did he know he would soon be navigating thousands of students and their families through the events of 9/11 and the 2003 blackout.

Several years later, while working at Hunter College, Adamson realized it was time for a career change. Prerequisite coursework at Hunter for a degree in speech-language pathology opened his eyes to audiology, a field he had never even heard of before. Within months, he was accepted into the Graduate Center Au.D. program and spent four happy years there from 2006 to 2010, with his research focused on meeting the needs of Spanish-speaking populations.

Learn more about the Graduate Center Au.D. Program

He now works for the Department of Otorhinolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery at Montefiore Medical Center in the Bronx, splitting his time between adult and pediatric ambulatory care. Prior to Montefiore, he was at the Center for Hearing and Communication in Manhattan, dispensing hearing aids and assistive listening devices. Today, he specializes in medical audiology, vestibular testing, working with Spanish-speaking patients, supervising audiology students, and training ENT residents. During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, Adamson was dispatched to nurseries and neonatal intensive care units in the Bronx to perform newborn hearing screenings.

Adamson is also an adjunct professor at Lehman College and the Graduate Center and has served as a student preceptor at Hunter College. At Lehman, he has taught courses in speech and hearing science to undergraduate and graduate students. He has taught several courses for the Graduate Center Au.D. program on multiculturalism, counseling, and auditory rehabilitation. 

Adamson is a proud member of three labor unions: SEIU1199 for health care, PSC-CUNY for teaching, and IATSE Local 306 for ushers/stagehands. In addition to working as a Broadway usher and a theatrical event planner, he annually plans and staffs about 30 opening and closing night parties for Broadway and the Tony Awards. 

He has accumulated stage credits as an actor, singer, dancer, and musician in performances at Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, the Gershwin Theater, St. Bart’s Church, the College of New Rochelle, Nyack High School, and many other venues. On screen, he had a role in The Normal Heart, and he appeared on an episode of the game show Cash Cab, “Cash Cab with Peter and Friends,” now available on YouTube.

Adamson lives in the Mott Haven neighborhood of the Bronx with his fiancée Cory and their dog Milo.