“Where do you start? What do you do?”: Australian speech-language pathologists’ preservice training in literacy

The insights of participating speech-language pathologists regarding their preservice training and readiness to work with school-aged clients in literacy raised a number of concerns across both theoretical knowledge taught and the practice opportunities participants received. The insights provided by academics served to amplify practitioner concerns rather than counter them. Should new graduates enter practice in the literacy arena without sufficient theoretical knowledge, socio-political context, and consultancy training, they will be unprepared to manage the complexities they will face in the workplace. Results expand on the literature available regarding speech-language pathology preservice training and preparation for working on literacy-based goals with school-age clients.