OT or Special Education?

Question

I'm going to be a high school senior in a month and i've been doing college/ career research. I'm not too sure i want to be an OT or a Special Education teacher. My college choices are schools that have both of those majors so i wont have to transfer, but there aren't that many. I need some insight from OTs and/or SE teachers so I can hopefully decide and maybe find more colleges with that major. Thanks for any help!

Answer 1

As others have said, OT's make more money than special ed teachers. However, teachers get more time off than OT's. OT's tend to be itinerant and have to deal with short relationships or repetitive work if they are in an agency. Teachers tend to stay put and have good relationships with colleagues and kids. Teachers tend to deal more with kids whereas OT's deal with more adults, unless they work in the school setting, which could be the best of both worlds.

Today teaching has become a much less attractive alternative because of the pressures of having to teach to standardized tests. You will be judged on how well your students do, so the pressure can be enormous. This may change in the future, but it is something that you need to be aware of because that is how it is right now.

However, if you teach children with fairly severe disabilities such as autism or life skills, you can avoid that problem. Teaching upper grade life skills students, who range from mildly mentally retarded to quite severe, is really, really fun. The kids are great.

Finally, you need to think about the environment in which you want to spend your time. Do you like being in schools or do clinics, hospitals or client's homes feel better? You will be spending a lot of time in this environment, so it is best to like it.

Good luck

Answer 2

OT's make more money, but you have to have a master's first- so 2-3 more years of school will net you more in the end.  You still get to work with kids, but aren't tied to classrooms.  However, they are stretched pretty thin in most districts, so your caseload (and thus IEP/evaluation) paperwork load will be pretty high.  As an OT, you will have the option of working at hospitals and clinics if you decide you'd like to branch out and try something different.

Answer 3

do you want to teach? or offer therapy?

Answer 4

OT, PT, and Speech-Language Therapy are one of the top 100 growing fields for the 21st Century.  You will earn more money in either of these fields.  In the US, OTs and SLPs must have their Master's Degrees in order to practice.  PTs must have their Doctorate Degrees.  You can work in a variety of settings such as public schools, hospitals, rehab clinics, private clinics, nursing homes, private schools, and home-health care agencies.

I don't know what the shortage of OTs and PTs are but there is a 36% shortage NATIONWIDE for SLPs.  With the Baby Boomers getting older, there will be a severe shortage within the next 5-10 years.

I am a public school SLP who also worked in a pediatric rehab facility.  I like the school setting because I can work with SE teachers.  I just find that I have to provide them with a lot of education and resource materials to help them understand their students' communication deficits and to teach them how to use communication strategies within the academic setting.  They don't make as much money as OT, PT, or SLPs do but they sure do work hard and have a desire to learn new ways to educate their students.

Answer 5

Special Education teachers are almost always assigned to a single school, with a single principal as their boss, working with a few dozen students for the whole year. Occupational Therapists who work with schools typically work with several, or even dozens of schools, and have a supervisor at the district level.

Increasingly, OTs are providing fewer direct services to students. It used to be that when the OT showed up, the teacher sent the child with the OT, they went somewhere, and did things together. Then the kid came back to the classroom and the OT would come back in a week or so.

That still happens a lot, but the trend is for the OT to work with the child long enough to find out what the fine and gross motor needs of the child are, then consult with the adults who see the kid more often.

In other words, if the OT determines that certain exercises will be beneficial to the child, they will teach the teacher or the educational assistant how to take the child through those exercises. That way, the kid gets to do them more often, but the OT may not see the kid again for months, or ever if the exercises work.

Ultimately, it's more beneficial to the kid, but some teachers are used to seeing the OT as the person who takes a kid out of their too busy classroom for a while, not as someone who comes into their too busy classroom and gives them more work to do. You get some tension there, sometimes.  

In my school system, it's a bit unusual for OTs to stay more than a year. OTs have job opportunities outside the school system. If the system treats the OTs anything like the system treats the SpEd teachers, the OTs just go work somewhere else.

Both positions have a great deal of paperwork. I train SpEd teachers and OTs how to use the computer system that manages our documentation for services. I may train some OTs this afternoon, in fact.

SpEd teachers have a large amount of paperwork for each child. Federal law requires progress reports every quarter for each child in SpEd, Individualized Education Program review at least once a year,  and a reevaluation every three years.

In my district, OTs have to do a service log--five minutes maybe--every time they see a child or consult with somebody about the child. An assessment may take a few hours of paperwork time, though. If there are OT goals in the IEP, the OTs are supposed to contribute to the quarterly progress reports, which requires some coordination and communication with the SpEd teacher. There's some tension there, too.

Answer 6

Occupational Therapists are in high demand. I am finishing up a psychology undergrad degree so that I can get my master's in OT.

Occupational therapists don't just work with kids. They do work with children with sensory disorders, etc but also many other fields.

OT's run therapeutic activity programs in psychiatric hospitals, and also in nursing homes. However, sometimes they just hire an activity director to avoid the cost.

An OT does official assessments for psychiatric hospitals to decide if a patient can live on their own. (including the egg test-can they cook an egg?)They can teach a paraplegic to drive a specially fitted car, they can show a newly blind person how to get around. OT's work with stroke victims to teach them basic life skills. The work with people newly confined to a wheelchair to reteach them how to get around a kitchen, a grocery store, etc.

Answer 7

You really need to think what is best for you. How do you want to help the kids. sitting in a room or go from school to school and paper work is really alot .