Occupational therapy how much school

Occupational Therapist. Allied Health Professional - Occupational Therapists. Occupational Therapist Grade 2. See all related jobs on SEEK. How to become an Occupational Therapist. To become an Occupational Therapist in Australia, there are two different pathways available, and you must hold formal qualifications. Complete an undergraduate degree in Occupational Therapy.

Undergraduate occupational therapy courses in Australia generally take 4 years. Alternatively, after completing an undergraduate degree in any field, you may complete a Masters degree in Occupational Therapy.

Gain work experience. This may include, for example, working as a nanny for a child with special needs or working at a summer camp for people with disabilities.

Register with the Occupational Therapy Board of Australia and meet the Board's registration standards in order to practise in Australia. Explore related qualifications SEEK users who have worked as an Occupational Therapist have studied these qualifications.

Bachelor of Occupational Therapy This degree develops skills and knowledge needed to pursue a career as an Occupational Therapist. See 7 institutions that offer this course in Australia. Bachelor of Science Develop broad skills in science to prepare for opportunities in a range of industries with this qualification.

See 34 institutions that offer this course in Australia and Online. Bachelor of Health Science This degree prepares you for a career in the health industry. There may also be an option to specialise in an area of interest. If you are considering occupational therapy as a career, by becoming an occupational therapist or an occupational therapist assistant, you are looking at a challenging and rewarding health care profession that can develop in many directions in a variety of workplaces.

Occupational therapy offers a lot of choice in terms of areas of practice and, for those who are lifelong learners, there are always new areas and specialties evolving and being recognized. Occupational therapists are the primary service providers for occupational therapy. Find out how a day in the life of an Occupationl Therapist here. Occupational therapists are a regulated health profession and, as such, must meet the registration requirements of a provincial regulatory organization in Canada.

To get into the accredited occupational therapy school of your choice, focus on earning a high overall grade point average in your undergraduate work above a 3. Some schools require up to hours of clinical experience prior to admission. Certification is voluntary, but shows you to be serious about your field.

All states require occupational therapists to become licensed. Check the state you plan to work in for additional fees and requirements. Occupational therapy assistants play a vital role in helping patients heal. Working under the supervision of an occupational therapist will also provide you with experience to determine if you want to advance your career.

I always think it is worth noting that OT is a popular second career. Many seasoned professionals are attracted to the meaningful nature of the work we do. Occupational therapists also enjoy a decent amount of flexibility in their work. Many jobs require you to be full-time or quit altogether, but OTs are often allowed to go part-time or PRN when they need more flexibility in their jobs.

Keep in mind that this might impact pay and benefits, though! There are certain settings where OTs are required to be very efficient with their time some might argue that taking pee breaks is a challenge in these environments!

However, there are other environments where you can set your own schedule, which often helps with stress management. Keep in mind that occupational therapists have increasing amounts of documentation and frustrations with reimbursements, like almost all of our fellow healthcare practitioners.

This has led many OTs to work long hours, decreasing their overall pay. For this reason, some OTs are starting to create specialized cash-based OT practices. Occupational therapy can be a heartwarming job, but it is often very physically and emotionally demanding. For this reason, many OTs experience burnout at some point in their careers. However, OT is such a diverse profession that it is relatively easy to switch settings or work in non-clinical OT jobs like utilization reviewer , clinical liaison , OT faculty member , health content writer , or director of rehabilitation.

Unfortunately, becoming an occupational therapist is not cheap. While debt can certainly be managed through frugal living and wise school selection, many OTs do find themselves in quite a bit of debt upon graduation. This can add to existing stress related to the job itself. In many schools, a doctorate OTD is being offered.

As I mentioned, though, the OTD is not required at this time. One thing to keep in mind is that each state in the US has its own rules and regulations for practicing as an OT. You need to get an OT license for any state in which you want to practice, and each state does have its own unique requirements for initial licensure, and also for license renewal.

Lifelong learning is a one of the major tenets of the OT profession. If you are seriously considering occupational therapy, you will want to take OT school prerequisites into account.

I would start by looking up various OT schools to see exactly what their prereqs are. For example, to get into the program I attended at NYU, I needed to take the following courses before starting the program:. As you can see, these courses may lend themselves to starting with a psychology or science major as an undergraduate. That being said, I always encourage people to pursue whatever undergrad major is interesting to them. There is a good chance you can get all of these prereqs in, but still major in something that is completely different.

For example, I was a religion major in college. For me, this was the perfect preparation, because it helped me get a high-level perspective on how humans experience meaning and craft their lives accordingly. And, a key to occupational therapy is understanding how people do this on a personal level, so we can help them participate in the lives that are most meaningful to them.

There are tons of different occupational therapy schools across the US. While some are considered better than others in terms of how selective they are, the accolades of their staff, etc. Instead, an impressive OT resume and fieldwork assignments are more likely to help you stand out as a new grad OT candidate.

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