About Me

I was part of the Empowerment Component where I believe that CBH&R programs are essential as it encourages the empowerment of people with disabilities and their families. Usually, people with disabilities face inequality and bias due to their perceived limitations. That’s why it is crucial to inform and educate the public about multiple disabilities and how to interact with persons with disabilities respectfully. As for the planning regarding the stakeholder’s meeting, we initially delegated tasks and responsibilities within the members of the group to boost efficiency. I assisted my groupmates in constructing a survey questionnaire for our target audience which were the parents of the children of E-Hope. I consider the dissemination of the survey questionnaire to be the most challenging part as we were only able to gather at about four responses and the other components including ours were not answered by them. We were informed as well by our instructors that the survey must be translated in Bisaya to be more apprehensible on the participants end. All these were just a learning experience to take heed of and I know despite our struggles and hardships in planning and preparing for the program it will eventually pay off. We were given a chance by our instructors to disseminate the questionnaire formally and properly to them face-to-face to ensure they wouldn’t leave out any questions on the survey. Implementation of the stakeholder’s meeting was a success, and we were able to gather pertinent data which was presented to our instructors. With the planning and implementation of the program entitled “Play to Cope, Learn to Hope”, I became a part of the technical team where our tasks involved establishing and initiating the meeting set-up, resolving technical issues or difficulties that may arise, and timekeeping throughout the program. I was entrusted in hosting the program as well which was way out of my comfort zone, but I was quite pleased of myself and my co-host for being able to entertain the participants and audience whilst also facilitating the program well. The program was a success; it was one for the books seeing as we were able to put a smile on the children's faces and somehow alleviate their situation.

At the start of the semester and with the introduction of this course, it boggles my mind whenever I think about how we are going to implement a CBR program. And I believe that this is beneficial for us occupational therapy students in acquiring leadership skills all the while teaching us on how to assess the needs of the community in relation to the scope and practice of our course. I can recall a few times during my junior high school years where I helped organize a program at our school and it was definitely not a walk in the park. There were a lot of planning, collaborations, and you have to consider unforeseeable situations. In my experience, the difficulty arises when there are incorrect expectations of the planning process. You see, many people believe that planning is something undertaken at the beginning of a program only. Although this is unfortunately often done, it is not effective. Planning must be an on-going process.

The topics tackled for this course since the beginning of the semester gave me a deeper understanding of the career path that I am pursuing as to what it will demand from me, how it will influence the lives of others through me, the scope of an occupational therapist and what I need to know to not only be good as a therapist, but to be a great one. It has me anxious about the mountainous path looming ahead and passionate to reach the finish line all at the same time. In talking about the mountains that I see rising ahead of me, I thought that I would reflect on the mountains that I have already crossed and how they impacted my grasp of occupational therapy and how it will help me to acquire leadership and managerial skills to adapt the occupational therapy process in order to develop, implement and evaluate CBR programs that meet the needs of the community.

Overall, I would definitely say that this course was able to enhance my problem-solving skills along with the ability to identify and assess the needs of the community in relation to the scope and practice of occupational therapy. My knowledge of occupational therapy and the profession has increased, and I am even more certain that I want to be doing this as a career. From this end of the mountain range, I can only see the obstacles blocking the destination from my sight. And yet I am not feeling deterred. Rather, I am excited to see what the mountains will contain and what I can learn from them. So, I think that I am going to do this one mountain at a time and never forget what I have learned and discovered on the way so that I am prepared for every challenge that approaches me.