What Gets in the Way of Language Supports in Secondary Schools? Using Qualitative Inquiry and Implementation Science as a Path Forward

Purpose: Adolescents with Developmental Language Disorder (DLD) have historically been “undetected, unserved, and underserved” in the schools by speech-language pathologists ([SLPs], Larson & McKinley, 2003). This pattern was reflected in a study analyzing national data under the Individual with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA, 2004) from 2010 to 2020: Although roughly 200,000 children were identified with speech/language impairment (S/LI) at ages five to six, only 25,000 retained this