09/01/2015
Occupational Therapy Program – Service Learning Activities During Summer, 2015
Written By Sonia Reiter, CHRP OT, Class of 2016
During the summer semester of 2015, second year graduate students in the occupational therapy (OT) department at SUNY Downstate had the opportunity to take their learning outside the classroom by engaging in service learning within three different communities of New York City. These events occurred within the context of the Designing Therapeutic Environments course taught by Professor Richard Sabel, MA, OTR, MPH, GCFP. Under Professor Sabel’s guidance, students in the course were learning various ways to assess and adapt the physical environment for individuals with physical disabilities in order to enhance mobility, posture, access, and participation in a variety of activities and occupations.
The first excursion on June 18, 2015 was to Logan Gardens, a Section 8 assisted living facility in Harlem that provides housing to seniors and disabled adults. There, OT students had the chance to meet with residents and perform a fall prevention home safety assessment in the residents’ apartments. Students used interviews, standardized assessments and walk-through home evaluations to determine the level of fall risk the residents currently had. Based on this evaluation, the student made recommendations for minor changes, such as removing throw rugs, increasing lighting and rearranging often used items to more accessible shelves, all of which could decrease the likelihood of a fall occurring within the home. Students and residents alike enjoyed spending time together and both parties learned from the experience. The residents learned about ways they can reduce their fall risk while students learned about how to communicate with a client and how to perform various assessments in a real world environment. Tom Pearl, a participating student commented, “It was gratifying to be talking to someone about issues that were so important and to get out of the classroom. The experience also made me much more aware about the number of home hazards one must be mindful of. It also occurred to me that one's home will never be perfect, and that isn't really the goal. There will always be areas to improve and there is always some risk in any activity. Helping clients become aware of the risk is critical.”
The second excursion gave OT students the opportunity to work with a population at the other end of the age spectrum. On July 8, 2015 the OT students spent the day designing and building a triwall positioning device for preschoolers attending school at the United Cerebral Palsy (UCP) preschool program in Brooklyn. Triwall is a type of heavy duty cardboard that can be used to fashion chairs and other positioning devices for children with disabilities. The preschoolers the OT students worked with were diagnosed with a range of movement disorders including Rett’s syndrome, cerebral palsy and spinal cord injury among others. They required positioning devices including seating, standing and side-lying devices that would help them to more easily play, learn and engage with teachers and fellow students. Before coming to UCP, the OT students honed their building skills in a lab facilitated by Derrick Ko, OTR, a Downstate alum who works with Adaptive Design association, Inc, whose mission is to ensure that people with disabilities receive the custom adaptations they need to fulfill their developmental, social, academic, and vocational potential; and to instigate widespread replication by providing a full range of hands-on education for people wanting to establish Adaptive Design Centers within their schools, organizations, and communities across the globe. Upon arriving at UCP, the OT students broke up into small groups. Each group met a child that needed a device and the OT the child was currently working with. The students took measurements of the child and talked with the child’s OT to learn about the child’s specific needs. The students then worked as a group to design and build a customized device for their particular client. Marisa Kaproff, a participating OT student reflected on the experience saying, “I thought it was really inspiring to actually interact with the kids and make a device that they were going to be able to use every day. I think the triwall day taught me the importance of being resourceful as an occupational therapist and how far a little innovation and creativity can go in the life of a child. I was actually so excited from the experience that I applied and received an internship with adaptive design association so I will be learning how to make more of these devices for children in the New York City area.”
The third excursion brought the OT students back in contact with a senior population, this time at the Lincoln Square Neighborhood Senior Center on July 10, 2015. There, the OT students designed and hosted a Fall Prevention Fair with a variety of booths and tables covering multiple aspects of fall prevention. Seventy seniors stopped in and spent time with the OT students learning exercises to increase strength and balance, assessing their shoes’ traction and stability, learning about ways to modify their home for increased safety and having their vision screened. Many of the seniors had advice on staying healthy into old age for the students as well including, “dance as much as possible” and “be sure to get out of the house every single day.”
When students in the SUNY Downstate OT program graduate they will go on to lives of service. Through service learning opportunities such as the ones experienced within the Designing Therapeutic Environments course, these students had the chance to not only get a preview of this future, they also were able to deepen their understanding of concepts and theories introduced in the classroom through connection to and action within the world outside.
