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The Impact of Racism and Ethnic Discrimination on Students\u27 Educational Experiences
Get PDFThis study explored how occupational therapy students’ perceptions of racism and ethnic discrimination impacted their educational experiences. Participants included 226 students ages 18-60 years old enrolled in occupational therapy entry-level, post-professional, or assistant programs throughout the United States. Students completed an anonymous web-based survey that included a demographic questionnaire, the Brief Perceived Ethnic Discrimination Questionnaire-Community Version (PEDQ-CV), and open-ended survey questions. Results found that students’ educational performance were negatively impacted by their experiences with racism and ethnic discrimination. While students reported to have experienced racism or ethnic discrimination within the classroom and fieldwork settings, classroom conversations and content related to topics on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) and anti-racism were limited. Based on the study’s findings, schools are encouraged to increase these conversations and implement supportive resources for students who have experienced racism and ethnic discrimination. Implications for improved occupational therapy educational experiences for students included recommendations to: a) acquire additional education in DEI-related subjects; b) continue to incorporate more conversations related to topics of DEI, racism, and ethnic discrimination in the classroom and fieldwork settings; c) provide simulated or real-life hands-on opportunities and experiences to work with people of color within the community; d) teach students how to appropriately behave and respond to racism and ethnic discriminatory situations; e) create program curriculums that focus on DEI and anti-racism content; f) host support groups with diverse people to encourage mentorship between students, practitioners, and community members; and g) diversify course content to include images, perspectives, and stories of people of color
A one-day in person workshop to assess novice occupational therapists’ perceived level of preparedness in supervising Level II fieldwork students.
Get PDFOccupational therapy fieldwork education is an in-depth experience required by the American Council of Occupational Therapy Education (ACOTE) to demonstrate entry-level skills as a practitioner. Level II Fieldwork allows the student to apply knowledge gained in the classroom, in a clinical setting under the guidance and mentorship of a qualified therapist, also referred to as a fieldwork educator (FWE). Fieldwork shortages have long been documented and continue to present challenges for academic fieldwork coordinators (AFWC) across the countryThe purpose of this Capstone was to evaluate the impact of an in-person workshop focused on the skills required for the fieldwork supervisory process on novice occupational therapy practitioners’ perceived level of preparedness in supervising Level II occupational therapy fieldwork students. The objectives of this capstone project are: To determine if a one-day, in-person, 6-hour workshop will increase the perceived level of preparedness of novice occupational therapists in supervising occupational therapy students for a Level II fieldwork placement
Integrating Mindfulness- Based Practice into University Curriculum: Building Resilience Among Undergraduate Health Science Students
Get PDFHealth science majors are both physically and emotionally demanding educational pathways with high expectations. These difficult fields of study place students at risk for stress-related illness, such as anxiety and depression. Many health science students are expected to succeed in their educational programs and provide care for others, despite the mental challenges they face daily. These psychological factors are continuously pushing this population of students to seek treatment for their mental well-being. A large body of assessment literature suggests that mindfulness can be used as a practice to relieve stress and enhance the mental well-being of undergraduate college students. Studies show that using mindfulness-based practices can help alleviate the stress and negative emotions these students experience both inside and outside the classroom. Mindfulness, in this aspect, can be used to achieve a clear mind and optimal mental stability. This integrative practice is efficient in symptom reduction and aims to improve overall psychological well-being. As a result of improved mental health within this population, students can metacognitively provide quality care in their clinical settings, while also meeting educational demands in their studies. With the implementation of mindfulness-based practice in the university setting, is expected to increase mindfulness and resilience levels. This study aimed to determine if an in-class mindfulness intervention in a sample of first-year undergraduate health science students in the university setting will elicit powerful changes for pre-healthcare undergraduate students and will be helpful in the development of their clinical careers, in terms of resilience.
Keywords: mindfulness, mindfulness-based intervention, mindfulness-based stress reduction, undergraduate students, health science students, mental health, mindfulness, resilience, nursing student
When they Came Home: Common Reintegration Issues and Interventions of Female Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans
Get PDFWith the increasing support of women entering traditionally male occupations, more females are becoming part of the veteran population. Because of the increasing population of women veterans, it is important to investigate the problems and support services exclusive to women. Previous research is limited when looking at the female veteran population and their experiences. This study strives to uncover through a qualitative descriptive research design the common issues that the population from Iraq and Afghanistan face in their process of reintegration into society. Some of these problems include finding community, finding identity, toxic male dominance. This study also evaluates the resources and effectiveness of these resources for helping women dealing with reintegration issues. This qualitative study finds commonalities between experiences and interventions. The themes discovered include finding community, finding identity, male dominance, interventions, and mixed feelings about the VA. The data comes from interviews of personalized experiences of women veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan living in the United States. The interviews consisted of open-ended questions that will hopefully help bridge the gap between health care providers and veterans. This research will also give more accessible research on the availability of resources for those dealing with reintegration problems
Through the Eyes of the Incarcerated: A Qualitative Content Analysis of Prisoner Reentry Through Memoirs
Get PDFOne in 100 adults in the United States are currently in jail or prison, equaling over 2.2 million individuals. Around 600,000 of those individuals are released from state and federal prisons every year. Unfortunately, these returning citizens are met with a system that has set them up to fail. Most of these individuals are determined to never go back, but the immobilizing challenges that they meet make it difficult, if not impossible, to be successfully reintegrated into society. The recidivism rate in the United States is the highest it has ever been at 44% nationally. We need to find and fix what we are doing wrong for the sake of returning citizens and our communities.
This qualitative content analysis was conducted to give voice to people with experience in the criminal justice system. The overarching question that guided this research was “what are the most prominent challenges that returning individuals face when they are released from prison?” The findings revealed that problems with reentry stemmed from a lifetime of challenges. These challenges were organized and coded into four categories: traumatic lives, prison and jail experiences, procedural justice, and the reentry process. The paper closes with a discussion about policy implications based on the issues returning citizens face
Emulating Evolutionary Principles For Agriculture: Designing a Biomimetic Vertical Garden by Mimicking Tracheophyte Evolution
Get PDFBiodiversity, particularly in the world’s equatorial regions, is under threat from human industry. Among the most daunting problems facing these biomes is that of the food industry’s continual expansion into what was once rainforest. Expansive monoculture (large cultivated swaths of a single crop species) are the primary threat to tropical biodiversity. This method of agriculture is harmful because it requires the clearing of land that once supported thousands of species in order to replace it with rows of a single crop. If more plants could be grown in a smaller horizontal square footage, farms need not rely so heavily on the clearing of undisturbed land. The objective of this project is to create a novel vertical housing unit for a model crop species, garden strawberries (Fragaria x ananassa), utilizing biomimetic principles in order to maximize plant growth while minimizing horizontal expansion. The creation of the vertical garden design involved analysis into recent applications of biomimicry in agriculture, particularly those employed in highly developed urban areas. After reviewing sources related to biomimesis and vertical garden projects, a 3D model was constructed utilizing CAD software. Design elements from Grant Associates’ biomimetic Supertrees were modified to incorporate hanging planters for stolon-producing strawberries. An aluminum chassis based on the 3D model was welded together, and finally, bare-root strawberries were placed within the tower
The Bookworm\u27s Brain: An Analysis on Emotion-Evoking Literature
Get PDFThis thesis draws on several literary studies to create and propose the idea that fiction can cause genuine attachment for audiences as well as produce strong, emotional reactions. This attachment can be achieved through the use of universal literary elements found in writing. Through the use of literary elements, authors are able to convey stories that allow audiences to grow true attachment towards their worlds, characters, and ideas. In addition, the acknowledgement of these elements is helpful in understanding why readers often feel emotional connections to the fictional stories they consume. Being able to understand these elements is important for both audiences and authors. For audiences, it is important to understand the emotional draw of novels and what elements cause attachment to plot lines and characters. For authors, it helps in creating stories that resonate with audiences through appealing writing. This essay uses three novels spanning different genre types to help identify how these elements are used. This essay also creates an analytical guide to the importance of these elements within writing. The novels - Salt to the Sea, The Secret Garden, and Heartless - are intentionally used as they offer different and contrasting stories, furthering the ideas that literary elements and emotional writing are universal
Impacts of Personal Cultural Orientations on College Students’ Psychological Health and Preventive Behaviors During the COVID-19 Period
Get PDFThe COVID-19 pandemic has brought dramatic life changes to individuals across the world. Personal cultural orientations of these individuals alter the way individuals respond to the pandemic and their mental wellness. This research investigates how personal cultural orientations impact college students’ mental health primarily anxiety, prevention behaviors and intentions to reduce the spread of COVID-19, and active coping strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants (n=155) completed measures of independence, ambiguity intolerance, masculinity, gender equality, mental health, prevention behaviors to reduce the spread of COVID-19, and active coping strategies to protect themselves during the pandemic. Results revealed that people with higher levels of independence more actively engaged in active coping strategies. People with higher levels of ambiguity intolerance related to more mental problems, more actively engaged in coping strategies and prevention behaviors. People with higher levels of masculinity related to more mental problems, less actively engaged in coping strategies and prevention behaviors. Lastly, people with higher levels of gender equality related to fewer mental problems, more actively engaged in coping strategies and prevention behaviors. These findings highlight the importance of the interplay between personal cultural orientations and both prevention behaviors and engagement in active coping strategies during times of crisis. Additional findings also show that females tend to have more anxiety than males and engage more in prevention behaviors and coping strategies during the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition, people with higher household incomes (\u3e$60,000) tend to have more mental stress than people with lower household incomes
THE PERCEPTION OF STROKE ON IADL
Get PDFBackground: Residents in a skilled nursing home receiving rehabilitative services following a stroke may value instrumental activity of daily living (IADL) tasks more than ADL tasks. This research investigates the impact of IADL tasks on quality of life (QoL). Purpose: The research questions were: How do individuals post-stroke and receiving occupational therapy services in a skilled nursing facility perceive their participation, or lack of participation, in IADL, and how does this impact their perceived QoL? Theoretical Framework. The theoretical framework that guided this project was the Model of Human Occupation. Methods. A phenomenological research-based qualitative approach designed to understand perceptions of stroke on QoL from lived experiences. Participants were recruited through convenient sampling, and interview questions and a Likert scale were employed. Results. Three themes: Doing things by myself, My level of confidence, and IADL tasks impact my QoL. This study revealed that participants found performance in IADL tasks meaningful despite having challenges with ADLs. They described how they valued doing things independently and would give full effort to regain function. Some participants also demonstrated self-awareness of their limitations and plans for effective discharge. Finally, all the participants expressed how IADL tasks impact their QoL. Conclusions: There was a positive connection between the performance of IADL tasks and QoL. Invariably, participants described a meaningful QoL with an increased chance of returning to IADL performance
“I Could Not Understand Anything They Said!”: Non-Native English-Speaking Instructors, Online Learning, and Student Anxiety
No full textIt has been previously shown that non-native English speaking (NNES) instructors have been rated lower within course evaluations and are typically criticized for their accents (Rubin, 1992; Subtirelu, 2015). Reasonings behind this have not been researched much, though the relevance of this topic is continuing to grow through online learning. The current study aims to determine if the presence of an NNES accent brings about more anxiety whilst learning new material compared to an instructor with a standard American accent. Participants were given a set of four videos divided into two segments: one containing videos with an NNES and the other containing videos with a standard American-accented speaker. After each video, participants were asked recall questions about the information that they had just received before moving on to the next video. In between the two segments, participants were given an anxiety scale to measure the amount of anxiety they felt whilst listening to the two videos. At the end of the study, participants were asked to fill out a Chinese language experience form and demographic information. Our findings indicated the instructor\u27s voice influenced recall and anxiety. Findings from the current study have implications for distance education and pedagogical practices