Northern connection

For a clinical fieldwork experience earlier this year, occupational therapy student Maeghan Johnson had the unique opportunity to work in two locations, one of which was over 1,400 kilometers away from her Winnipeg home.  

For eight weeks, Johnson spent two days a week at a school in the River East Transcona School Division and the rest of the week working with children in several schools in Nunavut, through Ongomiizwin – Health Services (OHS) at the Rady Faculty of Health Sciences.  

Johnson said the kind of work she did at both sites was similar, except for the students in Nunavut, it had to be done virtually.

“Here in Winnipeg, we have some different challenges that students will face coming into the school system, so as occupational therapists we go and help and make sure they can participate in what they want to,” she said. “In Nunavut, they have similar things, but in very different cultural context.” 

For the Nunavut placement, Johnson worked with children at a variety of age levels at schools in five different communities. She said one of the biggest challenges, particularly with younger kids, was the language barrier.  

“In Nunavut, kids in elementary school levels are taught mainly in Inuktitut. Once they transition to more middle and high school grades, they'll start to do more programming in English,” she said.  

“My educator put me in a few courses to learn how to speak a few words in Inuktitut, so that we could bridge that a bit.” 

Johnson worked with Marisa Buchanan, an occupational therapist (OT) with OHS, which provides speech language pathology, occupational therapy and physiotherapy to nine schools throughout the northern territory.  

Buchanan said this is the first time OHS has brought in a student for a fieldwork placement, even though it has been considered for a while.    

“It’s something that we've been back and forth about because of the feasibility aspect, like whether a student is going to have the same opportunity having a more virtual placement, but it worked really well with Maeghan,” she said. 

“From the perspective of keeping our schools supported, it made total sense to start supporting learner therapists and introduce them to the fact that this was an option, and to help build their competency in working with Indigenous peoples.” 

Return of the Sun a highlight

Johnson said one of the highlights was being able to take part virtually in one of the schools’ “return of the sun festival” – an event that marks the first time the sun comes over the horizon for the year.

“Some of the kids that I had been working with were taking around the screen that I was on and showing me different things, like the food and how they would cut it. They were super-excited,” she said.

Johnson said working with the schools was a rich experience that taught her a lot about building connections with the people she’ll be working with in her career.

“If you can build a connection with a student but also understand the context of the community that they're in, those interventions are going to be more successful,” she said. “Going forward, if I’m going into a new community, I’m taking that knowledge of building connections and then taking that forward into my practice.”

Johnson graduates from the master of occupational therapy program at the College of Rehabilitation Sciences this fall and will soon start working at a hospital in Steinbach. 

“I’m excited to be an OT. I wanted a career in health care that was a little bit more personalized and working more with people individually, helping them achieve their goals and working towards what brings them joy in life.”