Bootcamp

ATTENTION BOOTCAMPERS:

Thinking about Bootcamp last summer actually makes me cringe.  I can honestly say that I did not enjoy bootcamp.  The main reason I didn't enjoy bootcamp was because I was away from my family but I felt like it was too rushed to gain a good learning experience in my opinion.  I felt that it didn't shape me because many times my clients did not show up. I was also placed with students much like the ones that I work with at school each day.  I felt that a different population of clients would have been more beneficial to me personally.

I feel that an intensive training program is not a productive way of learning for everyone. As a clinician, I want to see the beginning, middle, and end of a clients journey through therapy. I guess working in the school system has spoiled me to this type of therapy services. I know this is not ideal for everyone. All of my clients had previously been tested and I was just picking up where the last student clinician left off. 

Intensive clinical training could be beneficial for educational programs such as ours because  several people in our cohort had never conducted therapy before coming to bootcamp so they were able to gain more clinical experience than those of us who are currently working as speech teachers or speech pathology assistants. 

Obviously, I would have learned more had I been a traditional student on a traditional campus program. Being a distance ed student I have learned more about time management and problem solving vs being a traditional student.  Being in a traditional classroom and doing longer placements in clinical settings would make it easier however that is not feasible for everyone who has jobs, families, and mortgages. 

Overall, I feel that WKU has an excellent program for distance education students. I have friends in other online programs who have had terrible experiences. I can't complain about the experience that I have had because overall it has been a wonderful learning experience.