The Human Communication Sciences (HCS) Clinical Team comprises a core team of clinical academics and professional services staff in the HCS Division integrated with an external team of NHS partners. The HCS Clinical Team is interdisciplinary, collaborating to lead innovation in the clinical education of the profession of Speech and Language Therapy to deliver an outstanding student experience.
During the Covid-19 pandemic they came together to create an innovative network of student support and mentoring; transformed our professional practice placements from traditional in-person delivery to telehealth delivery; created and published new national telehealth guidance for the Speech and Language Therapy profession and; embedded a new suite of clinical online learning student resources into our Speech and Language Therapy degree programmes.
The collaboration ensured the graduation of high quality graduates into a much depleted NHS workforce on time and with a new and essential skill set in telehealth delivery. Together, they achieved an exceptional student experience where students established their own communities of learning to support themselves successfully through very challenging times. The learning is now embedded into all HEIs who deliver Speech and Language Therapy programmes in the UK.