Faculty

Bio: I completed my BS in Occupational Science and MS in Occupational Therapy right here at Ithaca College! I practiced full-time in Pittsburgh, PA for almost 10 years prior to teaching. My fulltime and part-time practice settings include adult acute inpatient, pediatric inpatient rehabilitation for children, pediatric outpatient, and pediatric home health/early intervention.  In the pediatric settings my focus was to support children (and their families) with feeding difficulties, children and adolescents with hemiparesis, traumatic brain injuries, chronic pain and developmental delays in engaging in preferred occupations. 

I completed my PhD in Occupational Science at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (2018) where I was a member of research teams that explored how single-mother families engage in routines and completed my dissertation research on children’s perspectives and experiences of mealtime at home and school. 

Teaching:  The courses I teach focus on research, pediatrics, and assistive technology. In the fall, I teach graduate students about how to apply the knowledge they learned so far to better support clients through use of assistive technology and adapting environments in Technological Interventions in Occupational Therapy. In the spring, I co-teach with Amie Germain in the Pediatric Evaluation and Intervention course where senior level students learn about administering pediatric evaluations and designing interventions. Across the fall and spring, I teach Research Seminar to senior level students and Group Research I and II to graduate students in the form of conducting research projects with 8-10 senior/grad students relating to children and adolescents and how they engage in occupations and daily activities.

Research: Through the Group Research I and II courses, I focus on qualitative data gathering methods to help better understand children and adolescents’ (with and without disabilities) perspectives and experiences on how they engage in different daily activities and occupations. My work has explored children and their mealtime experiences, children with food allergies and how they manage food allergies in public food spaces, and most recently, children and social participation, and autistic adolescents and their perception of supports and barriers to participate in daily activities. Through my research, I strive to amplify voices and provide a space for people and populations who might not have the chance to be heard.