Purpose: School-based speech-language pathologists (SLPs) increasingly address feeding and swallowing disorders, such as pediatric feeding disorder and dysphagia, within educational settings. These conditions require interventions that are clinically effective, ethically defensible, legally compliant, and educationally relevant. Ethical tensions arise when balancing safety, educational access, and scope of practice. This tutorial uses the structured ethical decision-making model from Power-deFur that guides SLPs and interdisciplinary teams to identify ethical dilemmas, apply ethical and legal standards, consider possible courses of action, implement decisions, and reflect on outcomes. Grounded in the American Speech-Language-Hearing Association Code of Ethics and aligned with federal mandates such as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act and the Americans with Disabilities, as Amended (Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990, as Amended, 2008), this framework supports clinicians in navigating common challenges related to competence, interprofessional collaboration, and family–school dynamics. Case examples illustrate the model's application, equipping SLPs with a practical, evidence-informed tool for real-world ethical dilemmas in feeding and swallowing.
Kristen M. West (2026) studied this question.