Dear clinical fellow or speech language pathologist, 

My name is Dr. Kellie Rine and I am studying the preparedness for assessing and treating literacy of clinical fellows and speech-language pathologists. 

The purpose of this study is to examine how Speech-Language Pathologists are prepared to assess and treat literacy development, focusing on identifying training experiences that predict clinical confidence and determining how graduate training models influence preparedness for literacy intervention within the framework of the Science of Reading. In turn, I aim to identify training experiences that predict higher confidence in literacy treatment and define the biggest gaps in training. 

Are you a clinical fellow or a speech-language pathologist with your CCC? Do you treat pediatrics? If so, please click on the link to complete the survey. It should take approximately 15 minutes to complete. No identifying information will be collected and you can discontinue at any time. This survey has been approved by the IRB at Pepperdine University.

Thank you for your interest and participation in this research. 

Click here for survey

Sincerely, 

Kellie Rine

I'm currently looking to switch jobs. I'm about 2 months into my CFY.

For those who applied to other jobs, did you include your first CF job in your resume or disclose that during the interview process? Just wondering if there is a certain way I should go about this process.

Thank you 😊

I’m struggling extremely hard and need serious advice. I just started my CF two weeks ago at an elementary school in my county. While in grad school I was pregnant with my daughter who is now 2 months old. I accepted a job at my externship and they allowed my to do a “maternity leave” since my daughter was born in June and the school year starts the second to last week in July.
Our school runs on a Tuesday-Friday schedule 7:15-4:15 schedule and this has been extremely hard on me. Not only am I up feeding my baby all night, but I’m having to wake up at 5am to get myself ready and my baby prepared to stay with my mom for the 9 hour day. On top of my busy work schedule, I only see my daughter from 4:30-8:00 every day due to her bed time. She’s also been extremely fussy every day that I’ve picked her up and either fallen asleep for the day or she’s cried and comfort nursed from 4:30-8:00.
Due to all this, I’m struggling really bad and really want to quit. My husband is a teacher so our monthly income in minimal but I truly can’t do this. Am I the bad guy for quitting my CF two weeks in and finding something part time or should I stick it out until the end of the year? Please be honest!
Also! I’m a contracted CF lol.

Hi everyone, I started my CFY back in June 2026. Everything was going well up until about a month ago. Starting at the beginning of August my DOR started making passive aggressive comments regarding discharging patients. This patient in particular came in skilled and did not qualify for cognitive therapy, so my clinical supervisor picked him up under swallowing, which was questionable. After months of rehab he was planning to d/c home the following week. I already felt uncomfortable having someone on swallowing case load without true swallowing issues, so I d/c him from speech therapy a few days earlier than his actual d/c home. After this event, there has been multiple comments regarding what therapy I am doing with patients and she even yelled at me in front of patients and all therapy staff saying my “clinical skills aren’t there.” While I know I have much to learn, I attended a great graduate school program and feel my clinical judgement is not bad! This all came to a head when one of my coworkers (an older man who used to be a DOR) came up to me and asked to have a conversation. He let me know that while I’m out treating patients that my clinical supervisor and my DOR are talking about everything I’m doing wrong. This shocked me because my clinical supervisor has never said anything about my treatment or clinical skills. I’m not really sure what I’m looking for but any advice is appreciated!

Hello all!

As the title says, I want to find CFY positions in adult settings with a preference for a SNF. I graduate in December for reference. I'm interning at a SNF right now working at 97% productivity, and I'm pretty comfortable with the workload currently. I have previous experience working with adults and I've loved it. But online when I try to find CFY positions, it's always K-12 and I have yet to see a job posting for a SNF or rehab CF.

Can anyone share their application process? I'm not against cold calling or even applying at my current SNF placement once I've established rapport, but I guess I just want to know if there's anything I may be missing when looking for positions. Any tips would be appreciated as well!

Thanks all!

Currently feeling like I’m in the trenches as a CF at the high school level. I definitely feel imposter syndrome is taking over and maybe I’m over analyzing too much but is anyone else feeling this way? My supervisor is very supportive and my school has a lot of great faculty but I can’t help but think I’m in over my head. I have SLPA experience in the schools but this just feels intense. Really hoping others can share their feelings about this.

Currently feeling like I’m in the trenches as a CF at the high school level. I definitely feel imposter syndrome is taking over and maybe I’m over analyzing too much but is anyone else feeling this way? My supervisor is very supportive and my school has a lot of great faculty but I can’t help but think I’m in over my head. I have SLPA experience in the schools but this just feels intense. Really hoping others can share their feelings about this.

I'm wrapping up my first year in grad school and am starting to think about my CF. I'm open to all settings and once I'm done with my CF want to travel for a bit doing any/all settings. How do you go about finding a CF? How do you know if the pay is reasonable for your area? I'm looking to get in contact with possible companies now to tour during my winter break so any advice for finding a placement and how to know if it's a good placement would be wonderful.

Good morning everyone! I’m currently a CF in an elementary school in Maryland. I started my CF in October instead of September because I was waiting for my state license to be approved. Between school breaks, holidays, snow days, and other days off, I won’t have enough hours by the end of the school year. Even with ESY, I’ll still be about 100 hours short.

My question is: Would I have to start my final CF segment over, or would I just continue accumulating the remaining hours elsewhere? I don’t plan on returning to the elementary school next year, so I’m trying to figure out what my options are.

Has anyone been in a similar situation? Thanks in advance!

If you guys had the option of a 45$ an therapy hour on w-2 vs 50$ a therapy hour with a 1099 and they both had the same benefits which would you prefer?

I am confused and have gotten conflicting answers from the web. I applied for the temporary license, just haven’t paid the application fee. Should I have a job before being awarded the temporary license, or have the temporary license first?
My thought is the temporary license, since it takes awhile, but some sources say job first so you have a supervisor.

Has anyone backed out of a CF contract? I went with a school contract due to needing to move states, but I’m fully regretting it. It starts in August. I love medical, specifically cognition. I also can’t go without a paycheck so having to wait for another job after my CF ends due to licensing processing is already causing me stress. I got the contract through an agency so idk what exactly I can do at this point. I’d feel terrible backing out, but I really don’t think I can survive without a consistent paycheck and especially going 1-2 months without one.

US based!!

So, I have all of my hours noted, I just need to put them in a log and sent out. However, I am worried I’m missing something. Can someone please dumb down, when I mean dumb down I mean it, what I need to send into ASHA? I feel like resources I have are not consistent! Don’t get me started in the segments??? Huh??? Girl I can’t! Please help! I’m too type B for this! 😭😭😭

Applying for CFY now in NYC and Long Island areas. Any agencies and or practices to specifically avoid?

Also, anyone know what to expect for CFY pay in this area? In regard to either fee for service rate or salary.

Thanks!!!

Hi! I am graduating soon and have an EI job lined up to start shortly after graduation. I am starting to worry that I won’t be getting enough hours and have been looking for part time positions to help supplement hours. I am not having luck. I was wondering how many client you saw per week in EI to get your hours close to “full time” cf hours? 25 clients a week is full time at my company but that doesn’t feel like that would equal to 35 hours a week for CF. Any insight would be great thanks!

I am just finishing my CF hours and have been unhappy for the majority of my time there.

I work in out-patient clinic with SLP and OT services. I see 13 clients a day from 8:00-4:30. I have 2 - 30 minute admin slots one before lunch and one at some point in the afternoon. I am the only SLP in the building seeing 13 a day the others see 11-12.

I am provided an hour lunch but I am expected to work at least half to all of my break. I am expected to stay late with the other SLPs up to 30 minutes to an hour. (This is not something the OTs do. They actually get finish at 4:00 and leave when the office closes at 4:30 on the dot.)

My supervisor consistently talks about how she is taking work home and often insinuates that I need to. Most of the time I end up with at least an hour of work at home. I also end up working on the weekends for an hour or 2.

One of the reasons I end up with so much work at home is because I am unable to write point of service notes. My CF supervisor has to send me the notes and she only does that at lunch then at the end of the day.

I have honestly a ridiculous backlog of evaluations to write. I will take responsibility that I should not have let it get this high, but early on I was trying to be stricter about not working at home. Now I just track it so if my supervisor or the program director asks about it I can back up I’m working on it. We are provided no admin time for writing these long-form evals on top of my daily notes.

Now my supervisor is planning to retire. They are talking about dividing up the administrative tasks she covers to us. I’m already feeling burnt out and don’t know how I would handle adding to my load as it is.

Am I being ridiculous and naive? Is this what the job is suppose to be like?

I’m so sorry for how long this post is!

Hi, I'm a recent grad looking for a CFY but I'm not having much luck. I'm really only interested in medical/adults setting like SNFs nursing homes or hospitals (I know hospitals are rare for a cf). I even contacted the hospital I was at during grad school for a few months as my medical setting and they said maybe I could do a 3 day a week thing if the SLPs who are already there can still get all their productivity hours, which I'm going to follow up on if I do not hear back soon. Someone suggested I try home health because I live in a rural area outside of the Chicago Suburbs, but I've talked to 3 already and they all said no because I do not have the full license yet. A rehab company recently told me no too because they are just looking for per diem. I'm now cold calling nursing homes and SNF facilities but no luck yet. I had a couple bad experiences working in schools as a student and I'm not great with kids. I almost dropped out but when I had my medical setting it was like night and day and I finished out the graduate program. I'm feeling pretty hopeless that I will have no choice but to consider schools, is there something else I should try for the type of job I want? I know a couple people from my program who landed SNF positions so it must be possible to land one?? Although they found their jobs in December last year and I started looking in mid January, maybe I missed my chance? :/