Speech-language pathology graduate clinicians work multiple internships/externships during graduate school, and the majority of these placements are unpaid. ASHA has no policy prohibiting student payment for externship experiences. It's up to the academic programs and placement sites to decide payment details!

Unpaid internships are often considered the pinnacle of proving your dedication and responsibility. In this framework, asking for fair compensation is selfish. Grad students are "hurting their image" as a new clinician by needing to survive.

We don't buy it! The best way to demonstrate dedication to the job is to do it well and always seek to improve. We don't need classist ideas of success to succeed! Money is a difficult topic but it doesn't need to be a sore one. You deserve to survive grad school without constant anxiety about finances.

" If unpaid internships are the key to better jobs and bigger salaries, should we be concerned about the millions of lower-class students who can't afford to work for free?" -- Derek Thompson, The Atlantic, "Unpaid Internships: Bad for Students, Bad for Workers, Bad for Society." 

Sign this petition to show your support for paid speech-language pathology internships! Show other students we agree we should be fairly compensated for our time and labor! And as we graduate and gain our CCC's, advocate for internship supervisors to be paid too!