A Systematic Literature Review on School-Based Speech-Language Pathology Collaboration Research

Purpose: School-based teams are called to be collaborative in order to appropriately and effectively serve students. Speech-language pathologists play crucial roles on school-based teams. This systematic review sought to synthesize existing empirical evidence on collaborative perceptions and experiences in research that included school-based speech-language pathologists (SLPs). Method: A systematic literature review was conducted, which included Boolean search methods of the Science Citation Index Expanded, Social Sciences Citation Index, Education Resources Information Center, Academic Search Complete, Education Research Complete, and PubMed databases. Through an abstract, text screening, and progeny search process, 26 articles met the study's inclusion criteria. Relevant data were extracted from each article, analyzed, synthesized, and organized into themes to answer the research questions. Results: The main findings from the systematic review were organized into (a) study design and participants; (b) purpose, definitions, and collaborative activities; (c) perceptions of collaboration; (d) engagement in collaboration; (e) facilitators and barriers; (f) collaboration and telepractice; and (g) differing findings based on demographic factors. Conclusions: Underscoring the complexity of school-based collaboration, researchers have utilized varied designs and frameworks to explore collaborative perceptions and experiences in research including school-based SLPs. While SLPs generally view school-based collaboration as valuable, engagement in collaboration is not as clear-cut. The number of facilitators and barriers described, variability in frameworks and definitions, and limited disaggregation across demographic factors underlie the need for continued research and have implications for policy and practice.