---
title: "Augmentative and Alternative Communication Specialist"
description: "A speech-language specialist who assesses people who cannot rely on speech and fits them with communication boards, apps or speech-generating devices."
canonical: "https://nuecareer.com/careers/augmentative-and-alternative-communication-specialist"
last-updated: "2026-10-09T10:57:55.138Z"
---

# Augmentative and Alternative Communication Specialist

**Category:** Healthcare Practitioners and Technical · **SOC code:** 29-1127 · **O\*NET-SOC code:** 29-1127.00

A speech-language specialist who assesses people who cannot rely on speech and fits them with communication boards, apps or speech-generating devices.

Also advertised as: AAC Specialist; AAC Speech-Language Pathologist; Assistive Technology Specialist; AAC Consultant; Communication Device Specialist.

## At a glance

- **Median annual wage:** $97,870 (BLS OEWS, May 2025)
- **Median hourly wage:** $47.05/hr
- **Wage range (10th–90th percentile):** $62,900 to $134,160, with the middle half between $77,730 and $114,570
- **Total US employment:** 183,390
- **Typical entry education:** Master's
- **Preparation required:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET rates this "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed"
- **Projected growth:** +16.6% over 2025–2035 (BLS EP, 2025–2035)
- **Annual job openings:** 12,500 openings a year
- **AI-resilience score:** 33/100 — a NueCareer heuristic over O\*NET work activities and context, not a BLS or O\*NET figure

## Pay

National wage distribution, BLS OEWS, May 2025, across 183,390 US jobs.

| Percentile | Annual wage |
| --- | --- |
| 10th | $62,900 |
| 25th | $77,730 |
| 50th (median) | $97,870 |
| 75th | $114,570 |
| 90th | $134,160 |
| Mean (average) | $98,170 |

### Pay by state

The 15 highest-paying states, by median annual wage. The cost-of-living-adjusted column divides the state median by that state's BEA Regional Price Parity, so the columns answer different questions: the first is what the job pays there, the second is what that pay buys there.

| State | Median annual wage | Cost-of-living adjusted | Employment |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| CA | $118,970 | $107,451 | 16,930 |
| CO | $110,750 | $107,470 | 4,420 |
| DC | $109,380 | $99,526 | 390 |
| WA | $105,550 | $98,633 | 3,570 |
| NV | $104,510 | $104,532 | 1,270 |
| RI | $104,000 | $101,682 | 720 |
| DE | $102,760 | $102,958 | 690 |
| AK | $102,670 | $100,304 | 340 |
| OR | $102,660 | $99,322 | 1,600 |
| NJ | $101,560 | $93,341 | 6,840 |
| MA | $101,310 | $95,795 | 5,290 |
| NY | $100,610 | $93,226 | 15,310 |
| CT | $100,110 | $96,622 | 2,390 |
| FL | $99,990 | $96,689 | 10,080 |
| TX | $99,910 | $102,940 | 19,120 |

37 more states with published wage data are omitted here. The full table for all 52 states is at https://nuecareer.com/careers/augmentative-and-alternative-communication-specialist/salary-by-state, or as JSON at https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/augmentative-and-alternative-communication-specialist.

## Outlook

BLS projects employment to move from 193,400 in the 2025–2035 base year to 225,500 by the end of the cycle — a gain of 32,100 jobs, or +16.6%. Much faster than average: 16.6% against 3.5% projected for all occupations over the same cycle. About 12,500 openings a year are expected on average, counting openings from growth as well as from workers leaving the occupation permanently. Source: BLS EP, 2025–2035.

## How to get in

- **Typical entry education:** Master's degree (BLS Employment Projections).
- **Preparation level:** Considerable preparation — O\*NET's preparation band for this occupation is "Job Zone Five: Extensive Preparation Needed".
- **Related work experience typically required:** None.
- **Typical on-the-job training:** Internship/residency.

### Education people in this job actually hold

O\*NET surveys incumbents, so this distribution describes who is in the job today and can differ from the BLS entry requirement above.

| Education level | Share of workers |
| --- | --- |
| Master's Degree | 88.5% |
| Post-Master's Certificate | 11.5% |

## What the work involves

- Assess motor, vision, language and literacy skills to match a communication system
- Trial speech-generating devices, apps and access methods with clients
- Program vocabulary and page layouts on communication devices
- Write evaluation reports and funding requests for insurers and Medicaid
- Train families, teachers and aides to model language on the device
- Set and track communication goals in therapy or school plans
- Troubleshoot and update systems as a client's needs change

## Skills and knowledge

### Essential skills

- Reading Comprehension — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Listening — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Critical Thinking — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Writing — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speaking — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Learning Strategies — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Active Learning — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Monitoring — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Transferable skills

These are the skills that carry into other occupations, and they drive the related-occupation and career-change rankings on this site.

- Social Perceptiveness — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Instructing — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Complex Problem Solving — importance 3.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Service Orientation — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Judgment and Decision Making — importance 3.8 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Coordination — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Time Management — importance 3.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Systems Analysis — importance 3.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Knowledge areas

- English Language — importance 4.9 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Education and Training — importance 4.2 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Customer and Personal Service — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Psychology — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Therapy and Counseling — importance 4.0 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Administrative — importance 3.6 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

### Abilities

- Oral Comprehension — importance 4.5 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Oral Expression — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Expression — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Recognition — importance 4.3 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Written Comprehension — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale
- Speech Clarity — importance 4.1 on the O\*NET 1–5 importance scale

## Who it suits

O\*NET rates every occupation on the six Holland (RIASEC) interest areas, on a 1–7 scale. This occupation's strongest areas are Social (S), Investigative (I), Conventional (C).

| Interest area | Score (1–7) |
| --- | --- |
| S — Social | 6.09 |
| I — Investigative | 5.57 |
| C — Conventional | 4.03 |
| R — Realistic | 3.30 |
| A — Artistic | 3.00 |
| E — Enterprising | 1.44 |

### Personality fit

These scores are **derived by NueCareer**, not published by any government agency: they are cosine similarities between a personality type's trait profile and this occupation's O\*NET interest and work-style ratings, expressed 0–100. Treat them as a starting point for exploration, not as evidence that a type belongs in a job.

| Type | Fit score (0–100) |
| --- | --- |
| INFJ | 66.9 |
| ISFJ | 64.5 |
| ISFP | 63.6 |
| INFP | 58.0 |
| ENFJ | 52.2 |

Best-fitting types: INFJ, ISFJ, ISFP.

## Related occupations

O\*NET's primary related occupations, in its own ranked order.

- [Speech-Language Pathologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/speech-language-pathologist) — median $97,870
- [Speech-Language Pathology Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/speech-language-pathology-assistant) — median $48,430
- [Occupational Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/occupational-therapist) — median $100,330
- [Occupational Therapy Assistant](https://nuecareer.com/careers/occupational-therapy-assistant) — median $72,300
- [Audiologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/audiologist) — median $95,780
- [Occupational Therapy Aide](https://nuecareer.com/careers/occupational-therapy-aide) — median $39,160
- [Recreational Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/recreational-therapist) — median $61,960
- [Clinical Psychologist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/clinical-psychologist) — median $100,580
- [Advanced Practice Psychiatric Nurse](https://nuecareer.com/careers/advanced-practice-psychiatric-nurse) — median $97,550
- [Low Vision Therapist, Orientation and Mobility Specialist, and Vision Rehabilitation Therapist](https://nuecareer.com/careers/low-vision-therapist-orientation-and-mobility-specialist-and-vision-rehabilitation-therapist) — median $100,330

## Sources

- **O\*NET** — O\*NET 31.0 Database, August 2026. https://www.onetcenter.org/database.html
- **BLS OEWS** — BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025. https://www.bls.gov/oes/
- **BLS EP** — BLS Employment Projections, Table 1.2, 2025–2035. https://www.bls.gov/emp/
- **BEA RPP** — BEA Regional Price Parities by State, 2024. https://www.bea.gov/data/prices-inflation/regional-price-parities-state-and-metro-area

---

This bank includes information from the O\*NET 31.0 Database by the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration (USDOL/ETA). Used under the CC BY 4.0 license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). O\*NET® is a trademark of USDOL/ETA. NueCareer has transformed the data by joining it to BLS wage and projection data and deriving facet, personality-fit and AI-resilience scores. BLS and BEA data are public domain (17 U.S.C. §105).

O\*NET content is used under [CC BY 4.0](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). How these figures are sourced and derived: https://nuecareer.com/careers/methodology

JSON representation of this page: https://nuecareer.com/api/v1/careers/augmentative-and-alternative-communication-specialist