Action Steps Toward Equity in Communication Sciences and Disorders: A Program Evaluation of Student Self-Efficacy

Abstract Purpose: Within communication sciences and disorders (CSD), preparing students for equitable practice requires instruction aligned with social justice principles. Because students’ confidence in engaging in these practices may influence future behavior, this study examined the effects of an asynchronous program, Action Steps toward Equity (ASE-CSD) on undergraduate and graduate CSD students’ self-efficacy for practices aligned with social justice principles. Method: A pretest-posttest quasi-experimental design was used with undergraduate (n = 16) and graduate (n = 33) CSD students who completed ASE-CSD. Participants completed the Social Justice Scale (SJS; Torres-Harding et al., 2012), which assessed self-efficacy associated with social justice practices. Analyses examined pre- to post-program change, group differences, and whether general self-efficacy interacted with program outcomes. Because previous examinations of ASE-CSD suggested that students perceived the program as shaping their perspectives on interprofessional collaboration, an exploratory analysis of changes in self-efficacy for interprofessional interaction was conducted. Results: A mixed repeated-measures ANOVA revealed a significant main effect of time, indicating improved self-efficacy pretest to posttest across SJS outcomes, with a large overall effect. Univariate analyses showed significant improvement across all SJS subscales (i.e., attitudes, perceived behavioral control, subjective norms, and intentions to act) with large effect sizes. Gains were observed among both undergraduate and graduate students and remained significant after accounting for baseline GSE. A paired-samples t-test showed that self-efficacy toward interprofessional interaction scores also increased significantly from pretest to posttest. Conclusions: ASE-CSD supported growth in domain-specific self-efficacy toward social justice practices across undergraduate and graduate CSD students, even after accounting for general self-efficacy. As a flexible, asynchronous program, ASE-CSD may be a promising addition to CSD curricula designed to prepare students for equitable and collaborative practice.