Speech and Language Therapy and Rehabilitation Studies
You’re interested in Speech and Language Therapy (SLT) and making interventions that can improve the quality of people's lives - but do you know about the range of opportunities that will be available to you once your course is successfully complete?
Auditory Verbal UK intern
Auditory Verbal UK is an award-winning national charity that helps babies and young children with permanent hearing loss to listen and talk, without the need for lip reading or sign language (AVUK, 2019). Speech and Language Therapists are a vital part of the team and work closely with parents and professionals to support children to reach their full potential and raise expectations for deaf children in society more widely.
Emma Burton, a BCU graduate who interned
NHS or independent paediatric speech and language therapist
Paediatric SLTs support children with a wide range of communication and swallowing difficulties and work in a variety of settings including schools, nurseries, homes and clinics. Intervention provided may be direct (working with the child) or indirect (working with parents and/or professionals to change the environment and learning opportunities available).
Paediatric speech and language therapist working in a traded team
Traded services offer additional speech and language therapy support to schools who ‘buy in’. Bespoke services are created to meet the needs of individual students and settings, allowing the creation and delivery of innovative practice and joined-up working practices between SLT and education services.
Working abroad
It is possible to work overseas with your qualification in speech and language therapy. For example, two of our graduates have at separate times gone to Ghana to work with children. Also our Go Abroad Travel Scholarships available while studying here are great for building your relationships with employers overseas, if it is something you are thinking about doing after your studies.
Locum speech and language therapist
Locum SLTs usually specialise in working with either children or adults and often have specialist skills in particular areas of clinical practice. Working as a locum SLT typically affords a great deal of flexibility, particularly in relation to working hours, patterns, length of contracts and locations.
Adult speech and language therapist
Adult SLTs support adults with a wide range of communication and swallowing difficulties and work in a variety of settings including hospital wards, outpatient departments, clinics, hospices, residential homes and people’s own homes. Intervention provided may be direct (working with the individual) or indirect (working with family members and/or professionals to change the environment and opportunities available).
AAC specialist
Some speech and language therapists specialise in working with children and adults who find it difficult to communicate verbally and therefore use augmentative and alternative communication (AAC) methods. AAC includes both simple ‘low tech’ systems (e.g. signing or pictures) and more complex ‘high tech’ systems (e.g. voice output communication aids).
Further study/teaching
Following graduation and experience in the field you might wish to consider taking further qualifications, such as an MSc or PhD to research specific areas of interest. You may even move into education, training future speech and language therapists; there are staff at the University who have done just that!