2018 Occupational Therapy Assistant Program Information Sessions

REPAIRING LIVES, AS A PROFESSION: ST. PHILIP'S COLLEGE ANNOUNCES 2018 OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY ASSISTANT PROGRAM INFORMATION SESSIONS

St. Philip's College announced the dates for its spring 2018 Occupational Therapy Assistant Program information sessions today. The sessions are confirmed for Feb. 20 and March 20 from 5-6 p.m. in Room 320 of the college's Center for Health Professions building at 1801 Martin Luther King Dr. in the city's Denver Heights neighborhood (building marked as "8.2" on the interactive map http://ngskmc-eis.net/spc/imap-MLK/).

For details, contact program director Kathryn Freeman at kfreeman24@ngskmc-eis.net, 210-486-2421 or visit the program web page at http://ngskmc-eis.net/spc/ota/.

Prospective students are welcome to learn about the OTA program and the admissions process. The program prepares students for entry into a health care profession that helps individuals learn or re-learn daily life skills needed in order to function at their most productive and independent level (think wounded warrior care).

Assistants use their knowledge of human growth and development in the areas of physical, social and emotional functioning to carry out programs with clients of all ages. Those clients have varying disabilities resulting from physical injury or trauma, disease, aging, mental illness or substance abuse and may require therapeutic intervention. Assistants help patients establish individual self-care goals for re-entry into the community or to work. The activities assistants help patients employ may take many forms but might include activities as basic as daily tasks of bathing, dressing and cooking, or may be as complex as the use of computer assisted communication or work.

One unique aspect of the college's program is classroom work, "that allows community college students to present health and science research in a manner consistent with students at the graduate and doctoral levels in those fields of study," said Freeman.

"Normally it's not the assistant level student who does this type of research; it's at the occupational therapist doctorate level, and that's where I got the inspiration," said Freeman. "My students can defend their work."

Freeman cites occupational therapy assistant program alumna Lindsey Sandoval (SPC '17) as a student who was ready for a more challenging academic program following completion of the college's occupational therapy assistant program, enhanced with a research element that inspires inquiry.

"Lindsey graduated last fall. She has applied to the graduate level---master or doctorate depending on accreditation approval---at UT Health Science," Freeman said. "From associate to doctorate, I hope she can make it," said Freeman.

Freeman's recent student presenters were paired with such college occupational therapy assistant program clinical site partners as