Refocusing Our Education Effortsfor the 2017 Centennial Vision

Timothy Wolf, BS, MSCI

ABSTRACT. The role of Occupational Therapy educators and students inworking toward the AOTA 2017 Centennial Vision will mirror the effortsof our founders in establishing our profession. doi:10.1300/J003v21n01_32[Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Ser-vice: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail address: <docdelivery@haworthpress.com>Website: <http://www.HaworthPress.com> 2007 by The Haworth Press, Inc.All rights reserved.]

KEYWORDS. Occupational therapy, education, history

People only see what they are prepared to see.

–Ralph Waldo Emerson

A vision is often equated to a dream or an imaginary ideal state and avision without action is just that–a dream; however, a vision for whichwe prepare and direct our efforts toward will become our reality. Whenour founders originally sat down over 80 years back to envision the fu-ture of occupational therapy after The Reconstruction Movement, theirvision was one of survival in the health care system of the time. Our2017 centennial anniversary is a perfect opportunity to reflect on ourprogress and envision how we can thrive in the changing health care

Timothy Wolf is currently an OTD student.Address correspondence to: ( E-mail: wolft@msnotes.wustl.edu).

Occupational Therapy in Health Care, Vol. 21(1/2) 2007Available online at http://othc.haworthpress.com

© 2007 by The Haworth Press, Inc. All rights reserved.doi:10.1300/J003v21n01_32 309

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system of the twenty-first century. The time has now come for us aspractitioners, researchers, students, and educators to direct our actionstoward making that 2017 vision a reality. When examining the role ofour education system in that vision, our necessary actions can best bedescribed as a “refocusing” effort. The role of educators in workingtoward the 2017 vision will mirror the efforts of our founders in estab-lishing our profession. Three key areas that were paramount to theestablishment of occupational therapy reemerge in our 2017 vision:(1) The standardization of our educational institutions; (2) the role ofmentoring in establishing a professional identity; and (3) the impor-tance of networking within our profession and with other professionals.

After World War I, our profession had a major undertaking in deter-mining exactly what education an occupational therapist in the healthcare system of the time would need. The development of educationalstandards was viewed as vital for the advancement of the profession andin 1923 the profession adopted the first standards for occupational ther-apy education–a practice continued to this day (American OccupationalTherapy Association (AOTA), 1924, pp. 477). Today, even with educa-tional standards, great discrepancies exist in what we as graduates willlook like once we enter the workforce. Lack of continuity in skill sets ofnew practitioners has detrimental effects on how we are viewed by thehealth care community.

The 2017 vision states, “We envision that occupational therapy is apowerful, widely recognized, science-driven, and evidence-based profes-sion with a globally connected and diverse workforce meeting society’soccupational needs” (AOTA’s Centennial Vision, 2006). In order for usto be powerful, widely recognized, science driven, and evidence-based,our educational institutions need to adopt a level of standardization sothat every consumer and health care professional in the field will knowthe skill set that an occupational therapist should possess at all levels ofpreparation. Therefore, it is imperative for us to not only continue our ex-cellent educational standards, but also develop a model curriculum thateducational institutions can use as a guide for preparing new practitionersin the field. The model curriculum will help new and established pro-grams design their respective curriculums to prepare professionals tomeet the needs established by the 2017 vision. In addition to the modelcurriculum and written standards, there are implied roles of students andeducators that are necessary for the success of our vision.

During the beginning years of occupational therapy, many recruits tooccupational therapy developed strong long-term relationships with theindividuals who recruited them (Quiroga, 1995, pp. 213). Ultimately,

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these small networks grew into our profession. This mentor-protégérelationship was essential for young practitioners to develop profes-sional identity. Through the years and changing nature of our workforcethese relationships are not as common in our profession–which has neg-atively impacted our professional identity. Our membership numbersreflect this. Student enrollment in AOTA has seen the highest increaseout of any group in recent years only to have drastic decreases in firstyear of practice. Students join their professional organization not outof obligation or desire for the advancement of their profession. Truth-fully, several of us would not even view ourselves as what can be con-sidered as a professional. Students join for the tangible benefits ofmembership access to journals, discounts on books, or access to evi-dence-based practice articles. Once we enter the field, we no longerview these tangible benefits as necessary for success in the workplace,so we discontinue our membership. In absence of a mentor that effec-tively demonstrates the necessity of involvement in professional orga-nizations as essential for not only personal advancement but also theadvancement of the profession as a whole, a new practitioner will notestablish a professional identity. Ultimately, this trend can only bereversed by students actively viewing themselves as professionals. Asstudents, it is our responsibility to seek out mentors that we feel willhelp our transition from students into professionals. Many efforts needto be undertaken in this arena to help young practitioners develop a pro-fessional identity but it will all be for naught if we as students cannotchange how we view ourselves. This change will lead to progress to-ward the third area of concern–the importance of networking.

The ability to network is how our profession came to be in the firstplace–by reaching out to other professionals and consumers in the fieldwith similar interests and developing a national organization (Dunton,1926, pp. 433-439). We were a conglomerate of psychiatrists, psychol-ogists, nurses, volunteer workers, and anyone else with experience inoccupational therapy that could contribute to our common body ofknowledge. The importance of this type of networking has now becomemore vital to our future than ever before. The necessity for networkingis now practically being mandated by our research-funding sources.“Translational research” is now the catch phrase and other research sci-entists are being influenced by the National Institutes of Health (NIH)Roadmap to translate how their results affect everyday performance(NIH, 2006). We need to be at the table when those research partner-ships are being made with our solid background in everyday per-formance. We cannot be a “globally connected” profession if other

Forum: Achieving AOTA'S 2017 Centennial Vision 311

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researchers, policy makers, or consumers do not know who we are andwhat we contribute to the body of science. From personal experience, Ican say that other scientists will welcome our participation and contri-butions if we are there to inform them of how our research can be bene-ficial for all parties involved–in particular, our future clients. We asstudents need to able to communicate confidently with other health careprofessionals on how we can contribute to the body of science.

Much work is on our horizon and time is extremely limited. Elevenyears will pass in a blink of an eye. The groundwork has been laid; thepieces are coming together, and now more than ever we hold our destinyin our hands. My hope is that we can stand at the conference in 2017and read the press release that Dr. Carolyn Baum disseminated at theconference in 2006, except this time it will have become our reality. Ilook forward to see our vision with all of you at that time.

REFERENCES

American Occupational Therapy Association (1924). Adoption of “Minimum Stan-dards for Courses of Training in Occupational Therapy,” Archives of OccupationalTherapy, 2, p. 477.

AOTA’s Centennial Vision (2006). Retrieved June 1, 2006 from http://www.aota.org/nonmembers/area16/index.asp

Dunton, W. (1926). An historical note. Occupational Therapy and Rehabilitation, pp.433-439.

Quiroga, V. (1995). Occupational Therapy: The First 30 Years. Bethesda: AmericanOccupational Therapy Association, p. 213

Translational Research (2006). Retrieved June 1, 2006 from http://nihroadmap.nih.gov/clinicalresearch/overview-translational.asp

doi:10.1300/J003v21n01_32

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