Four faculty members to feature in AOTA Education Summit
September 16, 2020

Four USC Chan faculty members and two alumni will be speaking during the American Occupational Therapy Association’s 2020 Education Summit. The annual event brings together hundreds of faculty members from academic institutions across the country to learn about new trends, innovative classroom strategies and best teaching practices to implement in occupational therapy educational programs. Typically an in-person event, this year’s summit has been reconfigured as an interactive and engaging online learning experience that runs from Oct. 14-16.

Arameh Anvarizadeh ’05, MA ’06, OTD ’07, USC Chan’s director of admissions and associate clinical professor, kicks off the summit as part of a keynote address on ways of holistically transforming occupational therapy education. The keynote will address issues related to systemic racism and explore potential avenues for facilitating greater diversity, equity, inclusion and occupational justice within occupational therapy education.

Associate Clinical Professor Rebecca Aldrich ’05, MA ’06 will join her colleague from South Africa to describe an ongoing collaboration between USC Chan and the University of Cape Town, and demonstrate how “internationalization at home” using online platforms can increase the diversity of occupation-focused knowledge in curricula.

Associate Clinical Professor Samia Rafeedie ’05, OTD ’06, director of USC Chan’s professional entry-level program, and student Ty Kim MA ’20, OTD ’21 will discuss an approach to pedagogy that emphasizes “teaching by doing,” showing how occupational therapy educators can actually practice what they preach.

Associate Chair and Clinical Professor Julie McLaughlin Gray MA ’95, PhD ’06, director of the China Initiative, and alumna Psalm Ho ’17, MA ’18, OTD ’20, now with Peking University in Beijing, will cover the challenges faced by new faculty members in teaching roles, and offer best practices on curriculum development, student advisement and classroom and time management.

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