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Unprepared: A Qualitative Exploration Of The Preparation Practices Of Slps Practicing In Urban Schools, Audrey M. Farrugia-Bernard

Teaching and Learning in Communication Sciences & Disorders

The field of speech-language pathology severely lacks diversity, yet speech language pathologists serve an increasingly diverse population in schools. This qualitative study explored the academic preparation practices of speech-language pathologists working in urban schools. The findings revealed that the participants felt they were not adequately prepared to work in urban schools with children from culturally and linguistically diverse backgrounds independent of the model of multicultural education that they received in their graduate education. Results suggest that we need to connect multicultural coursework to local, urban communities in order to better prepare speech-language pathologists to work in urban schools.