Music Therapy Program Targets the Strategic Plan - College of Arts and Sciences

Intentionality in Curricular Design: 

The Music Therapy Program at UW - Eau Claire has 15 clinical placements prior to the internship. The students have participated with Lee Anna Rasar in a series of over 50 grants to conduct national research to assess the content of the music therapy curriculum on a national level and to integrate the American Music Therapy Association Professional Competencies into the curriculum at UW - Eau Claire. Students worked with Rasar on a Scholar project through the UW - System to conduct a major curricular revision and create a 10-year plan of course development based on the research findings. Each new course was created through a series of grants to establish the content through research, to pilot test the course, and then to assess the pilot run of the course. A developmental sequence for the courses was created with feedback from employers, clinical supervisors of students, and performance of students on the national competencies. Rasar was awarded the 2002 Professional Practice Award from the American Music Therapy Association for combining teaching, research, and community service through a series of grants in which she worked with her students and developed a curriculum that serves as a national model for excellence.University-affiliated internships and national roster internships are available for students. Students who are conducting sessions through the Music Therapy Clinic on campus receive third party reimbursement for their work. The on-campus clinic was designed by Dr. Dale Taylor who created the Music Therapy Program here. It contains two treatment rooms, one with a suspended wood floor to carry vibrations for work with people who are deaf and with people with autism spectrum disorder, an observation room, and a video editing/audio recording lab. Much appreciation is expressed to the Office for Research and Sponsored Programs for funding support for research and equipment purchase, including a Soundbeam. UW - Eau Claire is the home of the Biomedical Model of Music Therapy which was developed by Dr. Dale Taylor. UW - Eau Claire is currently designated as a training center for Neurologic Music Therapy, with Professor Lee Anna Rasar being a Fellow in the Robert F. Unkefer Academy of NMT.

Student Ownership of Education/Personal Acceptance of Responsibility:

Each student develops a Personal Professional Growth Plan that is based on the AMTA Professional Competencies as well as personal areas of interest and strength and areas of weakness that need to be strengthened. Beginning in the fifth semester students meet 1:1 with the music therapy professor each week for clinical supervision of their work as student music therapists as well as to present their current professional growth work for each week of the semester. The Personal Professional Growth Plans include a separate plan for each semester and for each break period prior to the internship to insure that each student has met the competencies needed to be ready for the internship. Students develop their own criteria to measure their progress on the competencies. IIntentionality is a hallmark of these growth plans. The supervisors of our students have highly praised them for their readiness clinically. UW - Eau Claire has a 100 % pass rate on the Certification Exam for Music Therapists.

International Initiatives:

UW - Eau Claire has a university-affiliated with the prestigious Royal Children's Hospital in Melbourne, Australia under the supervision of Helen Shoemark who is the leading researcher for Music Therapy in NICU. This internship is available each spring to a student from UW- Eau Claire. An internship in Cambodia with World Hope International is anticipated to open in 2008 with Jennie Morvak serving as the first intern. A trauma center in Jordan is also planning to offer Third World Trauma training for our students through a Clinical Experience course which would serve as the first month of internships in Third World Countries and which is hoped to itself become an internship. Service learning credit is available to students who are interested in translating the Music Therapy Populations Website into other languages, with a current need for Spanish in particular. Baiba Jakubovska from Latvia earned a scholarship to study music therapy here and then return to medical school in Latvia to incorporate the therapeutic use of music in her practice. Jovana Bogdanov from Serbia studied music therapy at UW - Eau Claire last year and is now integrating therapeutic music services into an orphanage in Serbia. Her host mom Signe Matson joined in with music therapy students and faculty to send over puppets, a keyboard, books, and equipment to make homemade instruments and look forward to the expansion of this work in Serbia and the continued networking with UW - Eau Claire and Jovana. One former graduate from Japan is currently practicing as a music therapist in Chicago, and we have several international students who are applying as majors for the next academic year. These students need to work with the International Education Office in advance of coming to the United States.

Scholarship/National and Regional Student Involvement:

http://www.uwec.edu/rasarla/students/studentpresentations07.htm

The presentations listed on the link above involved dissemination for information from the grants received for Rasar and these students. Three students have been accepted to present at the American Music Therapy Association conference with Rasar this November. Click here to view a listing of grants received by Rasar and her students.

http://www.uwec.edu/rasarla/students/studentgrants.htm

UW-Eau Claire Student Awards:

McNair Fellow

Music Therapy student Jeffrey Monroe Miller was the first UW - Eau Claire McNair Fellow to complete his PhD (2007 - University of Florida)

Blugold Fellows for Music Therapy:

• Catherine Hennessy
• Jill Redding
• Megan Hoffman

Diversity Mentor for Music Therapy:

• Hana Dehtiar

The following students have won Leadership Awards:

• Becky Risberg - 2003
• Molly Bjorngjeld (now Mendenhall) - 2004
• Rachel Dahl (now Bonson) - 2004
• Jacque Petroni - 2005
• Hana Dehtiar - 2007
• Megan Hoffman - 2010 Excellence in Scholarly and Creative Activity Award

The following students have been named as Outstanding Seniors for the Dept. of Public Health Professions:

• Aimee Hyland (now Latke) - 2000
• Amy Oppriecht - 2007
• Erin Spellacy - 2007

Diversity Programming:

The music therapy program services people in the community from the Hmong, Native American, Hispanic, and African -American communities and uses music to provide a bridge for them into their cultures. Lee Anna Rasar served as a Diversity Fellow and Hana Dehtiar served as a Diversity Mentor in the process of creating a percussion techniques course that integrated both clinical and ethnic diversity. Appreciation is expressed to Dr. Jeffery Crowell for his assistance with this project. The Music Therapy website includes a section on Multicultural programming. Rasar was awarded the Distinguished Service Award from the American Ethnic Coordinating Office in 2002.

Interdisciplinary Teaching:

Lee Anna Rasar has engaged in interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary teaching in Nursing, Humanities, Music, Music Education, Theater, Dance, and Communication Disorders. Music Therapy students and faculty have engaged in courses, grants, and developed courses that involved faculty from multiple disciplines across colleges within the university.

Community Involvement:

As previously noted, music therapy students and faculty service over 1000 people in the Chippewa Valley weekly. Music Therapy Professor Rasar received a national service learning grant through the Citizen Scholar project with Sacred Heart Hospital for the 2005 calendar year.

Technology:

The original Music Therapy website at UW- Eau Claire won the Study Web Award as "one of the best educational resources on the World Wide Web". Since the Music Therapy Program has recently moved from the Dept. of Public Health Professions in the College of Nursing and Health Sciences into the Dept. of Music and Theatre Arts in the College of Arts and Sciences, the multiple music therapy websites are being redesigned and will soon be placed under a common web address. The Music Therapy program was commended for its use of clinical as well as web-based technology in the American Music Therapy Association review report for program re-approval. In clinical work the Music Therapy program at UW - Eau Claire uses the Soundbeam and has a video editing lab and a recording studio which are used in research as well as with patients.

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