Speech language pathologists or SLPs diagnose and treat language, speech, and swallowing disorders. These things can dramatically affect children’s lives, and speech language pathologist jobs in schools are essential for helping support students’ health, social, and educational needs.
Language, speech, and swallowing disorders affect a child’s ability to read, write, speak, process information, and interact with their peers. Speech pathologist jobs in schools focus on helping students overcome these issues, improving their overall well-being and educational performance.
If you’re a speech language pathologist looking for school-based travel jobs, we can help you find lucrative and exciting travel SLP jobs and SLP teletherapy jobs across the country.
Travel Speech Pathologist Job Responsibilities
The speech pathologist job description includes many interventions to treat a variety of disorders and conditions. These disorders and conditions include:
- Speech sound disorders, like substituting one sound for another, omitting, or deleting sounds, distorting sounds, or adding sounds into words.
- Apraxia, when children know what they want to say but have a difficult time saying it. SLPs help with using inconsistent vowel and consonant sounds, irregular rhythms, emphasis on incorrect syllables, or pausing between words or syllables.
- Spoken language disorders, including learning, and producing sounds, associating letters with sounds, putting together sentences, and using correct word endings and grammar.
- Listening and comprehension, including assisting with word-finding, vocabulary, reading, spelling, and writing.
- Social communication disorders, like difficulties with language processing, social interaction, context, and meaning.
- Cognitive disorders that affect perception, memory, learning, and problem-solving.
- Voice disorders, like low or high pitch, raspiness, voice loss, or abnormal resonance, including hyper and hyponasality.
- Fluency disorders, particularly stuttering.
- Feeding and swallowing disorders with symptoms like eating limited foods, not using age-appropriate cups or utensils, taking a long time to finish meals, choking, gurgling after eating or drinking, or stunted weight gain or growth.
- Augmentative or alternative communication when needed, including high and low tech tools to facilitate language and communication.
- SLP education jobs also focus on the therapist being a member of a comprehensive and collaborative team that cares for the needs of the child.
Speech pathologist jobs require them to provide universal screening and develop Individualized Education Programs or IEPs for students who need them by attending meetings, collecting information about the student’s progress, and completing the necessary paperwork to remain in compliance with federal and state laws.
Requirements for Getting a Travel Speech Pathologist Job
The first steps to becoming a travel speech pathologist are to get a bachelor’s degree then complete a master’s degree program in speech and language pathology.
Next, you must first pass a credentialing exam, like the ASHA Certificate of Clinical Competence (CCC) in Speech-Language Pathology, which meets the licensing requirements in most states. Other certifications, like a child language and language disorders certification (BCS-CL) and board-certified specialist in fluency and fluency disorders certification (BCS-F), are also available.
After obtaining a certification, you can apply for state licensure. Every state has different requirements, but some states have entered the Audiology & Speech-Language Pathology Interstate Compact, an agreement in which multiple states allow SLPs to practice without having to obtain separate state licenses, making it much easier for speech therapists to practice across state lines.
States that belong to this agreement in 2021 include Alabama, Colorado, Georgia, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maryland, Nebraska, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Utah, West Virginia, and Wyoming. Seven states also have legislation to join, including Washington, Oregon, Iowa, and Texas.
In addition to these professional requirements, many facilities also require SLPs to be certified in CPR, specifically basic life support (BLS) for healthcare providers.
Blazer Jobs is here is connect you with the students who need you and place you in the destinations that fuel your passion for adventure. There are new adventures calling and children to inspire! Find your next SLP job with us.