Over the past three years at Flexspeak, we’ve spoken with countless school districts.
There is no single formula for AAC success. Every district operates within different constraints, cultures, funding realities, and leadership structures. What works beautifully in one system may not translate directly to another.
That said, the strongest AAC and AT teams, regardless of size or budget, tend to share a few consistent themes.
What Strong AAC / AT Teams Have in Common
1. Clear roles and responsibilities
The most effective districts don’t expect one person to do everything.
They recognize that generalist SLPs, already managing heavy caseloads, cannot be responsible for end-to-end AAC implementation alone.
Many have centralized AT teams responsible for assessment, device deployment, and systems-level implementation, while enabling SLPs and educators to carry it forward in therapy and classrooms. That segmentation matters given today’s caseload sizes.
2. A culture of curiosity
It’s easy to rely on tools that have been used for years.
The teams making the biggest impact are different. They are curious, agile, and willing to test new approaches for underserved student populations. These teams recognize current shortcomings and actively seek out strategies and solutions that could better serve those students.
3. Process clarity
When everyone agrees a tool is worth implementing, the real friction often isn’t philosophical, it’s procedural. Procurement can be complex. The strongest teams:
Understand their internal approval pathways
Know who the decision-makers are
Anticipate common bottlenecks
Clarify funding sources early
That clarity allows us to navigate the process together instead of leaving it all on their shoulders.
4. Leadership advocacy
Most successful implementations have a champion at the leadership level.
Without someone pushing momentum forward, even the best ideas stall.
Leadership advocacy doesn't mean a someone personally managing AT / AAC implementation. It means someone with decision-making influence who understands the value, removes barriers, and holds the process accountable. In practice, that looks like ensuring AAC and AT are reflected in departmental priorities, connecting the work to broader district goals like student participation and multilingual access, allocating protected time for training, and following through on procurement rather than letting it sit in limbo. They listen to champions (SLPs, OTs, teachers) working directly with students and incorporate their input on what would reduce friction in their workflows and, ultimately, amplify impact their work serving students.
5. Ongoing training culture
The most impactful districts don’t treat implementation as a one-time rollout.
They build ongoing professional development, coaching, and structured follow-up or refresher trainings for new staff.
They also prioritize documentation. Clear processes, training materials, device workflows, and implementation guides are housed in shared Google Drive folders, Google Docs, Trello boards, internal hubs, or other centralized platforms. Rather than relying on word-of-mouth or institutional memory, they create systems that make knowledge accessible and repeatable.
Importantly, they reinforce both asynchronous and real-time training. Stakeholders are consistently directed to shared documentation for self-paced learning, while also receiving hands-on, live coaching and collaborative PD.
The combination of async resources and real-time support creates durability. When staff change, the system does not reset. AAC / AT success is not about purchasing devices and products. It is about building capacity.
6. Cross-department collaboration
Strong teams align Special Education, General Education, IT, and often other departments such as Multilingual Learner services.
Universal Design for Learning does not live in a silo.
In one district, students were required to sign in through a specific single sign-on system, re-authenticating each session. While this may seem minor from a systems perspective, the central assistive technology team recognized the barrier it created for students with disabilities who rely on AAC for daily communication.
They reached out to IT, clarified real-world AAC use cases, and advocated for an alternative approach. As a result, the software was approved in a way that preserved accessibility, allowing students to access potentially life-changing communication tools without unnecessary friction.
That same district also saw the broader opportunity. They recognized that this wasn’t just about students with disabilities. The platform could function as a Tier 1 support within MTSS frameworks and a Universal Design for Learning solution in inclusive classrooms.
Because departments were aligned, the conversation expanded beyond compliance and accommodation. It became about access for all learners.
When collaboration happens across departments, assistive technology shifts from a specialized support to a system-wide access strategy.
The Bigger Picture
Again, there is no universal blueprint.
But across districts of different sizes and geographies, the pattern is clear: clarity, curiosity, leadership, and systems matter more than any single tool.
Strong AAC implementation is rarely about a product alone.
It is about the ecosystem that surrounds it.
