FATIMA THERESE L. VILLONES

Educational background:

Tertiary Education

Velez College - B.S. Occupational Therapy

F. Ramos St. Cebu City, Cebu

August 2019 - Present

Secondary Education

University of San Carlos - Talamban Campus

Sitio Nasipit, Talamban, Cebu City

S.Y 2017 - 2019

San Roque College de Cebu

Yati, Liloan, Cebu

S.Y 2013 - 2016

Primary Education

Lyceum de San Sebastian

Poblacion, Compostela, Cebu

S.Y 2007 - 2013

Achievements:

• College

Dean’s Lister: S.Y 2019 – 2020

Dean’s Lister: S.Y 2020 – 2021

My experience as an OT student in Velez College:

When I first started as a student in Velez College, I was expectant and confident that I would be learning so much, especially considering Velez’ reputation for producing competent health professionals and topping the board exams. I knew that I was among many who aim to be these people one day and, similarly, I wanted to be someone competent in what I do. I was excited to meet new people and have college friends. I’m glad there are relatively less students in OT compared to other courses since I got to know everyone from my batch easier. As we continued with the course, I was able to learn what OT really is and what we can provide to individuals whether with disabilities or not. I was able to improve my communication skills and build on my knowledge of the different conditions and how OT can help. At present, I am still working on these practical skills and helping others as much as I can with what I know.

My Component:

At the beginning, I was part of the Mental Health and Humanitarian Crisis group. There were 7 of us in the group and I really like how everyone was always collaborating and making divisions to make sure that everyone can do their part. The mental health component is one of the less common one that is known to the public since many are not aware of the importance of mental health and the consequences of neglecting your mental health, especially if you are a PWD or a caretaker of a PWD. It is a pressing issue, and one that we as OTs should be advocating.

Planning CBH&R Programs:

At the beginning, we were asked to find a community and evaluate them to see how we might help them. Our group was the first to meet with the E-Hope staff since they were the community we wanted to include in our CBR program. I was the person responsible for taking notes during the interview with the staff. During the stakeholder’s meeting, I was part of the technical team wherein I was responsible for sharing presentation slides and music during the ice breaker. During the preparation, I was also able to help come up with questions for the stakeholder’s analysis.

We were able to talk with them about their community, their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats. I was able to learn about their goal and to whom they cater to. It was a very eye-opening experience since I was not very familiar with taking care of someone with cancer at the time. I was very happy that at the end, they were the community that the instructors also picked since I believe that there is a lot that we can do to help this specific community. Hearing their answers during the stakeholder’s meeting further supported this realization and made me realize how resilient these people are.

Designing of CBH&R Program:

I was responsible for designing a program that caters to the kid’s mental health. We decided on a program entitled #BeYoutiful which makes use of self-esteem worksheets to help children learn to focus on and explore their positive traits and accomplishments, rather than on negative thoughts. I was able to give the goals, plan of action and the delegation of tasks for the program.

When designing the program, I had the survey results in mind wherein many children with cancer can have lower confidence and self-esteem due to alopecia or hair loss. This is a common side effect for those undergoing chemotherapy for cancer treatment. I believe that we can help children regain their self-esteem and boost their confidence through this program. Having them think of and write down their positive experienced and positive traits can make them appreciate themselves more.

Implementating of CBH&R Program:

During the program implementation, the mental health component was merged with the livelihood component since there were only 3 components that was going to be implemented, which consisted of the health, education, and livelihood component. In the implementation of the livelihood program, It’s the Tote that counts, I was once again part of the technical team. I was responsible for showing the presentation slides and sharing music during the program and making sure that there were no delays due to technical difficulties or that any technical difficulties encountered will be addressed immediately.

During the implementation of the program, I got to see exactly how important CBR is, and I got to appreciate what we got to do. We were able to help the parents in this community and leave a mark on them by giving them the knowledge necessary to create their own self-sustaining online business. I hope that in the future, the community will be able to make sure of this knowledge and build their own successful businesses.

At first, I never thought that completing a CBR program would be such as tedious process. It took up the bulk of the semester and there was a lot that we had to do from the planning to the designing to the implementation. There were a lot of analysis to be done, figuring out the problems, and then making the objective tree, the logical framework and everything else. Even though we were numerous, it took a lot of collaboration and planning to get where we are now. However, at the end, it was all worth it when we saw how fruitful all of our hard work was and how much it helped the E-Hope community.

My classmates were very hardworking during this. They understood what the assignment was and delegated the tasks properly and made sure to communicate with the E-Hope community and with the instructors. Everyone was given a task and the leaders made sure that everything goes smoothly and that no one becomes confused when making the program. The E-Hope community were also very active and would help set schedules and made sure that the participants will be present on the day of the stakeholder’s meeting and on the program implementation. I’m glad that we also got to help the E-hope staff and we got to teach them new things that can help them take better care of themselves and of the children in the community.

The teachers were also very helpful by giving us the feedback that we needed to complete the program. They were there when we needed help or were confused with something about the stakeholder’s meeting and they also helped us by going to the center itself to help with the program implementation. Overall, it was a long process but with a satisfying end. Wee got to learn a lot from the instructors and from the community itself. Hopefully they will be able to make use of what we were able to teach them and that they were able to gain new experiences by participating in our programs. In the future, I want to be able to help more communities by implementing more programs in the CBR field.