SOUTHERN ILLINOIS COLLEGIATE COMMON MARKET

OCCUPATIONAL THERAPY ASSISTANT PROGRAM 

 

The Occupational Therapy Assistant Associate Degree Program is offered through the Southern Illinois Collegiate Common Market (SICCM) and is a cooperative program with John A. Logan College, Rend Lake College, Shawnee Community College, and Southeastern Illinois College. Each April, six students from each college are admitted to begin the program the following fall semester. The total size for each entering class is twenty-four students.  

Students are admitted to the Occupational Therapy Assistant (OTA) Program and register for all courses on their home campus. General education courses are taken on the home campus, but OTA core courses are taught either at the Southern Illinois Collegiate Common Market Regional Instructional Center or within patient/client care agencies. After all classes and fieldwork internship are completed within the OTA program, students graduate from their entering college.  

Because the regions of the four cooperating colleges are large, traveling is an integral element of the consortium program. Time commitment is significant in this intense curriculum, and includes travel to OTA classes and fieldwork assignments. Efforts are made to minimize travel where possible, accomplished by grouping classes and incorporating web-based instruction into coursework.  

CURRICULUM DESIGN 

The OTA curriculum is designed to provide a progressive transition from beginning student to entry-level clinician. During the coursework and internships, students will develop entry-level competencies necessary to provide services to persons of all ages who have functional loss due to physical, neurological, social/emotional, cognitive, or developmental disabilities. The occupational therapy assistant graduate will possess the technical skills necessary to collaborate with the occupational therapist in providing occupational therapy services, incorporating values and attitudes that reflect the profession's practice standards and ethics. 

In the OTA curriculum there are eight general education courses and fourteen OTA courses. The OTA courses have both lecture and hands-on laboratory components. Substantial portions of the lecture section of two OTA courses are web-based. Students quickly become adept at communicating with each other and the faculty via the Internet and using the computer as a research, learning, and communication tool. It is helpful for students to have use of a home computer, although computers and Internet access are available on all college campuses. The OTA classrooms also have computers and Internet access available for students use. 

The OTA program is full-time only, with courses offered in specific sequence. All OTA courses in a semester must be taken and passed in order to progress to any OTA coursework of the next semester. Both OTA and general education courses must be passed with a grade of "C" or better. Laboratory hours are based on a 1:3 ratio, with three class contact hours required for every registered laboratory credit. The program is designed to be completed within two academic years, including one summer session. Supervised Level II Fieldwork comprises 640 hours (16 full-time weeks) of the final semester.