Diversity event: smart goalsThe Diversity Committee's Open Mic event was quite the success despite a few roadblocks along the way. During the event, participants were asked to develop SMART Goals related to the Black Lives Matter (BLM) Movement. We have listed them below ! Let this inspire you to do something similar and encourage marginalized voices to be heard.
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what does it take to serve on sota as a president, vice president, secretary, and treasurer? Scroll down for the answer!PRESIDENT: Plan out the bi-weekly meeting, lead the meeting, support the committees, relay messages to Dr. Thomas, Set up zoom link, manage position openings, manage the voting process. (Pictured below: Jean Inoa) VICE PRESIDENT: Collaborates with the president, assists in supervision and facilitation of actions set forth by the Executive Board and communicates with student liaisons. Delegate and hold committees accountable for meeting their goals and deadlines. These past 2 terms, I supported my future colleagues through regular check-ins and addressed all concerns and ideas to enhance our unforgettable experience here at WCU! (Pictured below: Vanessa Mauricio) SECRETARY: Records the minutes at the Executive Board and student body meetings, coordinates location and timing of meetings with the institutional regulatory body, distributes association announcements (Pictured below: Angeli Gutierrez)
TREASURER: Maintains financial records, manages the SOTA Venmo account, makes deposits and reimbursements, manages the cash box in the OT snack room, collects and keeps all receipts (Pictured below: Karis Choe) want to learn more about leading a committee? scroll down to read about what public relations, social, fundraising, community service, diversity, wellness, and newsletter have to say!PUBLIC RELATIONS CHAIR: PR has the duty of updating WCU OT’s social media page on Instagram. The responsibilities are posting any promotions requested by committees/students, sharing the excitement our OT curriculum holds, advocating for current issues (especially showing support and alliance with the BLM movement), and reminding students why OT is amazing through posts on stories and on the feed. PR also aims to be as interactive with fellow OTs, OT students from WCU or other schools, and prospective students! (Pictured below: Jeserine Garcia)
SOCIAL ACTIVITIES CHAIR: Formulate and organize formal and informal social events to increase interclass socialization. Social events such as, unofficial mixers to the brewery, spirit week, cohort mingles virtually, networking with PTs, etc. (Pictured below: Ray Chan) FUNDRAISING CO-CHAIRS: Fundraising committee chairs raise funds for the SOTA board and delegates representing WCU CGS Occupational Therapy Department. By organizing creative events and collaborating with other committees, the committee is able to raise funds and while advocating for causes. (Pictured below: Anyssa Balcazar & Fariba Toha)) TIPS FOR FUTURE FUNDRAISER CO-CHAIRS: Graduate school can be tough but you are tougher! Use your resources to get the most out of your experience. Make friends with your cohort, mentors, mentees, and faculty. Ask your professors how their days are going. Join SOTA! Join Committees. This is a once in a lifetime experience. Work hard and have fun always! The fundraising committee utilizes a lot of creativity necessary to plan events and ensure success. COMMUNITY SERVICE CHAIR: Collaborate with different communities to understand the need and the opportunities for West Coast Occupational Therapy students could volunteer and donate their time and skills along with needed items and goods. Organizing and managing volunteers based on availability, time, and position for different settings and organizations. (Pictured below: Sarvin Nassabi Tabari)
DIVERSITY CHAIR: This chair is responsible for sharing information on inclusion and diversity not only within the committee but also, with all WCU students. Utilize your committee to help educate yourself and others about micro-aggressions, BLM, gender disparities and other cultures etc. Your job is to advocate for inclusivity for students at WCU. Hosting and facilitating open conversations among students is important in this role. Also, facilitating and organizing the traditional Open Mic Event is very important. In this task you collaborate with faculty and students to create a space of open discussion. (Pictured below: Becky Sepulveda)
NEWSLETTER EDITOR: The newsletter editor is in charge of organizing and distributing the stories that are shared on the Online WCU Newsletter. They assign stories to committee members, coordinate with committee heads for ideas for stories, and are in charge of posting the stories onto the website. (Pictured below: Howard-Rick Obando)
WELLNESS CHAIR: Organize at least 2 formal meetings and informal wellness events to increase OT program and inter-cohort wellness. Share and encourage ways to enhance wellness during graduate school through stress relieving activities. Provide tools and ideas to maintain a successful and realistic school-life balance. (Featured below: Ireland McKean)
7/31/2020 sota summer 2020: OTAC and aota student delegates, alumni liason, and pals coordinatorsRead Nowwant to meet the people who have the inside scoop on OTAC and aota? Need to Know more about the alumni liason or what goes into being a pals coordinator? Scroll down to learn more!OTAC DELEGATES: Liaisons between OTAC and West Coast University. Plan and organize student events in collaboration with OTAC. Relay important messages and updates happening in OTAC to the student body and faculty. It is not required, but recommended that both members attend the Annual Conference and Expo, and relay information presented to SOTA. (Left to right: Alyssa Mercado & Irene Mendoza) TIPS FOR FUTURE OTAC DELEGATES: "It is importantly to constantly check your emails from OTAC to relay any information as soon as possible to everyone else! Make connections with student delegates from other schools and plan events together or brainstorm ideas if you ever feel stuck! Have fun and be creative with this position. It is such a great opportunity to connect with other student delegates and board members of OTAC. " ASSEMBLY OF STUDENT DELEGATES (ASD): Liaisons between AOTA and West Coast University, relaying messages about policy, professional development, and opportunities for student leadership. Communicates interests, news, and questions to and from ASD Steering Committee and AOTA. The ASD Delegate Alternate assists with relaying this information, and takes lead in the absence of the delegate. Both members attend the ASD Annual Meeting prior to AOTA’s Annual Conference & Expo, and convey this information to SOTA members. (From left to right: Levana Tabanpour & Isabella Hakobian) ALUMNI LIASON: Serve as the liaison between the WCU OT current students and alumni to promote networking, develop connections, allow current students to stay informed, and overall allow alumni to share resources and tips in order to help the current students succeed in graduate school and as a future practitioner. Main event is hosting an alumni panel for the current students to attend and allowing a back and forth dialogue with the alumni. (Pictured below: Francis Espina)
PALS COORDINATORS: Organizing at least 3 main PALs sessions by coordinating the best day and time for all cohorts to be able to participate and help out. Coordinating individual sessions to make sure all of the requests are taken by the mentors. Keeping track of the hours that the mentors are accumulating throughout the semester. (Pictured below: Bryan Pae & Patricia Bartolome) Want to know what it takes to be a class representative or historian? Scorll down to find out!CLASS REPRESENTATIVE: Relaying any messages from the SOTA board to your cohort. Also be the liaison between your cohort and the faculty, as well as your own professors. Be an advocate for your class and keep your class up to date with the schedule, assignments due, and important deadlines. Collaborate with other class representatives on having cohort mingles with one another so cohorts can get to know each other outside of class. (From top-down: Ashley Venzon, Grace Agnes, Brooke Denton, & Katie Willebrands)
CLASS HISTORIAN: Capturing your cohort’s memories and journey through photos and or videos. In charge of cohort birthdays and assisting the class representative when needed. Organizing your cohorts board: Patrice Marshall, Samantha Luu, Maggie Abuan, & Jessica Mallari) Have fun and be creative! Upload photos to Google drive so future historians in your cohort can add on to the collection of memories.
Think out of the box! Take screen shots of zoom parties, facetimes, class presentations, etc. Make a portfolio using google slides and put memories, quotes, pictures! Make a cohort IG and post birthday shoutouts and fun stuff - Maggie Quarantine workout planWhen we asked Blue Cohort fitness queen Patricia Bartolome to construct a workout regiment to accommodate homebound students without gym equipment, she did not disappoint. Check out her program below!
With the current circumstances, it can be easy to get in a rut and gain a lil’ “quarantine 15”. What better way to improve mental clarity and stay healthy than working out! Here are some bodyweight exercises you can do in the comfort of your own home that doesn’t require any gym equipment! However, you can definitely step up your game and perform these workouts with some weights or bands if handy. Have fun and stay active! LEGS
UPPER BODY
CORE
CARDIO/HIIT 20 MIN TOTAL: 40 sec on, 20 sec off, 3 rounds total, 1 min rest in between each round
*You may customize this routine any way you'd like. Focus on one group of muscles a day! Focus on two! Do the entire thing! But whatever you choose to do, make sure to treat yourself to rest days (but not too many). a letter from the sota president, by jean inoaDear Student body,
I know we are all suffering through these though times due to the current state of the world. Having to go through a pandemic, fighting against social injustice and systemic racism has taken a toll on us. The pandemic has caused us to study remotely, limit social interactions and has changed life as we knew it before. I know it is difficult, I have struggled with the issue of isolation, and the way it changes your thought patterns and emotions. I will speak a little about my experience through out this time. I have personally felt lonely during these times because I am far away from my family, even though I speak to them very frequently. I also feel uncertain of how all this is going to play out and affect my future, I am scared and worry about the future. If any of you feel this way you are not alone. Where do I start with the social injustice that we are seeing in America? The murder of George Floyd was the last straw to wake us up as a society. Even though African Americans have been freed from slavery for over 150 years, Black people are still being mistreated. Therefore, we as the up and coming generation must advocate for change. We need to take charge and hold people accountable, inject our view of the new society, and support the people that can help with this change. It is very unfortunate that here in the United States this division is still in existence. We need to be that change for the betterment of the country. The pandemic can also be a great time for us to use and reflect on these issues, our experiences to better shape the future, and to make us a better practitioner overall. I hope these words resonate with some of you and thank you for taking the time to read it, IT IS OUR TURN TO BE THE CHANGE! Your SOTA President, Jean Inoa What have our professors been up to during quarantine?At the beginning of the term, the Newsletter Committee sent a survey to WCU-CGS faculty. The survey had questions related to how COVID-19 has impacted different aspects of their life. Samantha Luu (Blue Cohort Historian) looked at the data we collected and tells us all about the teachers had to say below: COVID-19 quarantine, where online occupational therapy school became a thing. Learning how to become occupational therapists online most likely never came into our minds as students and most definitely not in the minds of our professors. As occupational therapy students, we learned about the importance of engaging in meaningful occupations in order to provide client-centered care. We have experienced the effects of graduate school consuming our everyday lives and how we may experience occupational deprivation as students. For our professors, their duties consist of preparing our course material to ensure we are prepared as future OT clinicians. School life may have consumed our lives to the point where we may forget what it was like to be bored or feel like you have absolutely nothing to do. With our current pandemic and quarantine lockdown, our professors found themselves engaging in new activities to engage in, reading new books, and reflecting on the things they missed from pre-quarantine life. During quarantine, not everyone can resort to their go-to activities when it comes to relieving boredom or indulging into their interests. Our professors have found themselves revisiting or exploring new hobbies such as “baking, painting, and running outdoors” during quarantine. With our current pandemic, some professors picked up new hobbies such as “learning to do men’s haircuts” since hair salons have been closed for the past few months. One professor even shared, “I have been sewing masks or thinking about sewing masks obsessively” in response to California’s mandatory mask requirements. Another professor found that quarantine has allowed them to revisit a leisure occupation, “It had been a long while since I’d read for pleasure. I’ve started a book club with a friend where we meet on Facetime or go for a walk once a week to discuss the book we’re reading”. With the amount of time we have been spending at home, it is expected we would find ourselves discovering new shows to watch, picking up great books to read, and even engaging on social media. One professor mentioned watching Netflix’s new show, “Never Have I Ever” which was released during quarantine. During the months of April and May, television networks like ESPN and online streaming networks released new shows to keep our world entertained during quarantine. One professor found themselves watching ESPN’s ten-part docuseries, “The Last Dance” and another professor watched the new miniseries, “Defending Jacob” released on AppleTV+. As we find ourselves working from home or learning from online, we may also find ourselves having more breaks than usual. Our professors recommended to use our study breaks to indulge in great books such as “Race Matters by Cornell West”, “Untamed by Glennon Doyle”, “Everything You Never Told Us by Celeste Ng”, “Becoming by Michelle Obama”, and “If it Bleeds by Stephen King”. If you prefer to spend your study breaks moving around or to relax your brain from doing activity analyses, one professor suggested “TikTok” as an outlet. However, be sure to set yourself a timer as scrolling on TikTok could be very addicting. Spending the past few months on quarantine lockdown could really impact our daily routines, patterns, and occupational engagements. When professors were asked about the first thing they would do once it is safe to return to their pre-quarantine lives, some answered with “hugging people, traveling, going back to the gym and personal training”. Like many, not seeing our loved ones everyday can definitely make staying at home difficult. One professor is looking forward to “visit and have a dinner date with my mom!” and another professor shared “other than see family and friends (obvious answer), I can’t wait to stroll around Home Goods or TJ Maxx.” As we continue our temporary online journey of occupational therapy school, it is important to keep in mind that we are not alone and that our professors understand our challenges. One professor wants us to know, “If you are feeling ____, there’s a high likelihood I’m feeling it too. While you may be by yourself looking at your screen, you are not alone”. As we learn how to adapt and modify our clients’ environments, our professors remind us to “try to create an environment that supports your learning; clean/organize your environment, take breaks, establish a morning routine, get dressed, etc.” and how we need to “create a conductive learning environment. If at all possible, don’t attend class in your bed. Get ready each day and find a space in your living environment that supports your learning. Engage with your professors. Turn your camera on, use the “raise hand” feature, share ideas and thoughts in the chat box. Take breaks away from your computer after class!” Also, we should “keep a routine, get up and get ready as you were going to school in person, set time aside for meaning and valued occupations (like hobbies, rest, play and sleep!” While we are on our virtual learning platform, remember to “turn off your phone while in class and close down all other windows. Reduce distractions. This program requires engagement. Don’t miss out on your graduate education because you were texting or on social media.” Most importantly, as occupational therapy students we cannot not forget that, “OTs are doers. Learn one, do one, teach one. Practice all the skills on yourself or on your loved ones.” Remember, we are like chameleons—OTs are quick to adapt to every situation. We teach others how to adapt and modify our activities to increase occupational performance. Let us keep doing our part to flatten the COVID-19 curve. We, West Coast University Occupational Therapy Students, are taught to always think two-steps ahead for our clients. We are always “Ahead of the Curve”.
Zoom fundraiser eventNear the beginning of the term, Brooke Denton (of Teal Cohort Class Rep fame) led WCU students in a Tahitian dancing workshop as part of a Fundraiser Committee event!
Jeserine Garcia (Teal Cohort) shares her experience about the event with us below: "On May 30, I had the pleasure of participating in our very first virtual fundraiser in the form of a Tahitian dancing lesson taught by our lovely classmate, Brooke Denton. It was quite nerve wrecking at first, but the hosts were delightful and made the experience comfortable and welcoming. We grooved to fun songs and it was quite tiring (my hips cramped up every now and then)! The best part was that my family and other families participated and donated too. It was definitely fun and if this were to occur again, I highly recommend joining in!" PALs Mentor programDuring week 7 of the Summer 2020 term, PALs coordinators Bryan Pae and Patricia Bartolome hosted a one of a kind tutoring session. In fact, they hosted the first virtual tutoring session in WCU history! Patricia tells us more about their experience below: "With the circumstances we are in today, we’re all adjusting and trying to figure out how to learn remotely. For some, it’s easier for them to learn in their own room or some quiet environment at home. For others, they need that person-to-person interaction to succeed. As the PALs coordinators, we are determined to provide the academic assistance our peers want and need - regardless of this new platform. On Thursday June 18, PALs hosted their first virtual group session for the new MSOT cohort, Maroon. This session covered practical topics from Eval & Screening I and Basic Patient Care, including ROM goniometry, PROM, and bed positioning. These sessions are typically done in person in Room 200, with stations set up for the students to move freely to whatever topic they need help with. But since we were doing this virtually, we set up Google Meet links as the “stations” for Maroon to simply click and join in. It was very nerve wracking in the beginning. Not knowing what technical difficulties may arise, or how overwhelming the mentors may feel when there’s an influx of students. It’s hard enough to structure the flow of the session knowing you have a high chance of speaking over each other. But once all the mentors and Maroon got the flow of things, it went as smooth as can be. We were able to create a safe place for them to ask an abundance of questions, practice their skills, and offer suggestions for practical success. Even Dr. Golembeski and Faula jumped into the session, providing additional clarification and constructive feedback (from the actual proctors themselves!). Shout out to the PALs mentors for pulling through and getting creative in helping Maroon out, despite the limited resources. Special shout out to Grace from Blue for simulating scapula PROM with a cut up piece of paper, ruler, and pillow (pictured below). You guys are much appreciated, and this session wouldn’t have been a success without your willingness and dedication. And for Maroon - the fact that you started this program virtually, knowing you had to take some risks, knowing the academic rigor may be different: This just goes to show how resilient you are to learn and succeed. Y’all are troopers. Forreal. We plan to continue the next 2 sessions online if the remainder of the trimester stays remote. Suggestions were received and will be implemented to foster the needs of our peers even better. Until we’re back on campus, we will do all we can to facilitate learning and promote academic success virtually.
Feel free to schedule an individual tutoring session by visiting https://westcoastmsot.wixsite.com/pals or contact us if you have any questions. Remember, we are here for YOU! :) Bryan Pae, PALs Coordinator [email protected] Patricia Bartolome, PALs Alternate Coordinator [email protected] |