A Love Letter to Fellow Speech Pathologists

Dear Fellow Speech Language Pathologists,

This is a love letter. It is written with respect for the work we do, the training we carry, and the responsibility we hold every time someone trusts us with their care. It is also written with honesty, because our profession deserves more of that from within.

We are highly trained clinicians. We hold graduate degrees, complete clinical fellowships, maintain licensure, and engage in continuing education year after year. We are experts in communication, swallowing, feeding, cognition, voice, and language. And yet, somewhere along the way, many of us began to act as though we needed permission to own that expertise.

Over time, we have allowed parts of our scope of practice to be slowly encroached upon. Other professions now offer services that overlap heavily with what speech pathologists are trained to assess and treat, often with less education, fewer clinical hours, and limited accountability. Too often, we respond by staying quiet or stepping back, worried about conflict or about being seen as difficult.

Protecting our scope is not about ego. It is about patient safety, quality of care, and professional responsibility.

We have also participated, sometimes unknowingly, in the devaluation of our own work. We underprice our services. We accept reimbursement that is not sustainable. We justify our rates before anyone has questioned them. We allow our expertise to be treated as interchangeable or optional.

When we consistently charge less than the value of our work, we reinforce the idea that our knowledge carries less weight. That message affects how others see us, but it also affects how we see ourselves.

There is also the growing belief that our education and experience are not enough on their own. Expensive certification programs have begun to overshadow foundational training and clinical judgment. While continuing education is important and necessary, it should enhance our skills, not replace trust in our professional reasoning.

A course can be useful. A certificate can add depth. Neither should supersede years of education, hands-on experience, and thoughtful clinical decision-making.

Your degree matters.Your experience matters.Your clinical judgment matters.

This letter is not about blame. Many of these patterns were shaped by larger systems such as healthcare reimbursement models, productivity pressures, and a profession that has long expected its workforce to be flexible, agreeable, and self-sacrificing. But we are allowed to question what no longer serves us.

We are allowed to say this is within our scope.

We are allowed to say this work has value.

We are allowed to trust ourselves without constantly seeking external validation.

Loving this profession means advocating for it. It means setting boundaries. It means charging appropriately. It means mentoring newer clinicians to see themselves as skilled professionals, not helpers who must earn their worth through overwork.

We do not need to be louder. We need to be clearer. Clear about our role. Clear about our value. Clear about what we will and will not accept.

This is an invitation to stand a little more firmly in who you already are and to remember that the letters after your name represent real expertise.

With respect and solidarity,

A fellow Speech Language Pathologist