Program Overview

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Do you enjoy working with people? Want to make a difference in people’s lives? If you are keen to become a registered speech and language therapist and want to shape the future of communication, our BSc Speech and Language Therapy pre-registration course can help you achieve your goals. Alternatively, if you are already in full-time employment in a relevant role, and have the support of your employer, you may be interested in our Speech and Language Therapy Degree Apprenticeship which also leads to BSc Speech and Language Therapy. There's never been a better time to train as you can now apply for a £5000 grant that you won't need to pay back! There is also an extra £3000 funding available depending on your personal circumstances. You can find more information about eligibility and how to apply on the HSC Scholarships and Funding page. Speech and language therapists work with people of all ages who experience communication and swallowing difficulties, enabling them to maximise their independence in their social, academic and working lives. Successful completion of our BSc Speech and Language Therapy programme leads to eligibility to apply for registration with the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) as a speech and language therapist. This is a client-focused course which uses varied learning methods to integrate theory and clinical practice. You undertake day visits and blocks of practice education with speech and language therapists in the workplace. This practical experience helps prepare you for your future as a qualified therapist. Our course is continuously developed to reflect contemporary health, education and social care practice. Clients, voluntary groups, other allied health professionals, speech and language therapy clinicians and service managers continue to be involved, in order to ensure that changes in speech and language therapy practice are incorporated, keeping your course up to date. The School of Health and Social Care is proud to work closely with our Service User Reference Group (SURG). SURG is made up of service users, carers, and volunteers who generously share their first-hand experiences of health and social care. We work collaboratively with SURG to design our courses to ensure that we truly are putting the needs of patients and clients at the heart of what we do. SURG are involved as part of our course application processes and often form part of our interview panels. This helps us to be confident that we are selecting the right applicants for the course and their future careers. SURG members also support the delivery of our teaching sessions and research activity, which means you’ll benefit from an insight into their lived experiences of living with a diagnosis, health condition, or circumstance. You’ll find that not only does your clinical knowledge expand, but your empathy, compassion and ability to advocate develops also. You can find out more about SURG by reading their blog here . You share some learning experiences with other healthcare students on similar undergraduate courses. The learning includes inter-professional collaboration, especially during placements. Working alongside other health professionals means that you also have the opportunity to gain expert knowledge from them. The cost of required uniform will be fully covered by the school.

Placement information

Placements are an integral part of this course and are sourced for you from across a variety of settings (e.g.NHS organisations, independent/private SLT services, charities, and Schools) and client groups (e.g. paediatrics, adults, etc). Your placements will vary in length and are linked to the objectives of the modules you are studying. You will have a minimum of 150 clinical experience sessions (approximately 75 days). Placements will have different structures which include face-to-face, virtual, via telehealth. If you have significant experience in a particular field, we may not return you to that setting so you have the opportunity to advance your skillset. Speech and Language Therapy placements tend to fall Monday-Friday and within office hours (e.g between 8am -6pm). To provide the best opportunities, we use a wide network of placements across the Eastern region, which means you will likely have to travel approximately 90 minutes from campus. We allocate students on placements throughout the entire East of England region (e.g. Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Essex, Hertfordshire, Norfolk, Suffolk) and surrounding areas. Subject to eligibility, you may be able to claim the NHS Learning Support Fund which provides reimbursement of excess travel (i.e. above your regular commute to campus, and inclusive of costs such as hire cars, etc) or accommodation costs incurred due to undertaking practical training on clinical placement. When you start your course, the SLT Placements Team will collect information about your previous work experience, whether you can drive, and other circumstances in order to aid placing you.

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DBS and Occupational Health Checks

This course requires a satisfactory Occupational Health Check and enhanced Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) Check (including child and adult barred list check) - both of these are organised by the University. Please contact our DBS team or Occupational Health team if you have any questions in relation to these checks. You will also be required to register for the DBS Update Service (information relating to this service can be found here ). You will need to register for this within 30 days of your DBS certificate being issues. The Update Service costs £13 per year, which the University will reimburse. You will need to keep the subscription to this Service active for the duration of your course. If you do not register for the Update Service within 30 days, or your registration lapses, and you later attend placement where this is a requirement, you will have to pay for a new DBS check, which will enable you to sign up to the Update Service. Please contact our DBS team if you have any questions relating to this. A satisfactory Overseas Criminal Record Check/Local Police Certificate is also required, in addition to a DBS Check, where you have lived outside of the UK in the last 5 years for 6 months or more. Further information about how to obtain an Overseas Criminal Record check can be found on the Gov.uk website . Mandatory Vaccinations As you may be aware, the UK government has now revoked legislation that requires all health and social care staff working in sites regulated by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in England to be fully vaccinated against Covid-19. Whilst vaccination is not essential, we encourage our applicants and students to be fully vaccinated. Find out more about what this means for applicants to this course .

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Professional accreditation

Approved by the Health and Care Professions Council (HCPC) for the purpose of providing eligibility to apply for registration with the HCPC as a speech and language therapist. Recognised by the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists (RCSLT) for the purpose of applying for newly qualified practitioner membership. Why we're great.

• Grounded in social model approach to disability
• Consistently links theory to practice
• Opportunity to extend learning through year abroad or placement year

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Study abroad

Your education extends beyond the university campus. We support you in expanding your education through offering the opportunity to spend a year or a term studying abroad at one of our partner universities. This four-year version of our degree allows you to spend the third year abroad or employed on a placement abroad, while otherwise remaining identical to the three-year course. Studying abroad allows you to experience other cultures and languages, to broaden your degree socially and academically, and to demonstrate to employers that you are mature, adaptable, and organised. If you spend a full year abroad you'll only pay 15% of your usual tuition fee to Essex for that year. You won't pay any tuition fees to your host university

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Placement year

Alternatively, this four year version of our degree allows you to spend your third year with an external organisation. This is an opportunity to further develop professional skills in the workplace by working in a field associated with Speech and Language Therapy practice, for example as a Teaching Assistant, a Speech and Language Therapy Assistant, a Care Assistant, etc. Your HCPC and RCSLT pre-registration placement hour requirements are met within the standard three years of the BSc Speech and Language Therapy programme. If you complete a placement year you'll only pay 20% of your usual tuition fee to Essex for that year.

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Specialist facilities

Our School of Health and Social Care is located at two sites:; in the Kimmy Eldridge Building at our Colchester Campus and in The Gateway Building at our Southend Campus. Our Speech and Language Therapy courses are delivered at our Colchester Campus. Within our School of Health and Social Care, we have a range of specialist clinical laboratories and IT facilities to assist you with the effective learning and acquisition of new skills; for students of our BSc and MSc Speech and Language Therapy, we have two specialist labs with equipment for researching speech including a wide range of assessment and intervention planning materials. We offer excellent physical and online resources in terms of libraries, computer labs, datasets, archives and other research materials. Take advantage of our links with the Institute of Social and Economic Research (ISER), which conducts large-scale survey projects, many for government, EU and other public agencies, and has its own library. The UK Data Archive is also based at our Colchester Campus and stores national research data.

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Your future

We currently have graduates working in clinical and management positions in local and national NHS trusts, hospitals, schools, local authorities, justice system, private and not for profit organisations, reflecting the range of locations in which speech and language therapists are employed. 98% of undergraduate graduates from the School of Health and Social Care are in highly skilled employment or further study (Graduate Outcomes 2022) Find out more careers in speech and language therapy from the Royal College of Speech and Language Therapists .