All occupational therapy students are required to successfully complete the certification examination administered by the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy (NBCOT) before they can practice independently. The need to repeat the examination can result in stress, anxiety, and financial hardship. This paper explores the relationship of preadmission factors, academic and fieldwork performance, and demographic variables to successful first-time attempts on the certification examination for occupational therapists. Data were gathered from 144 student files in a Master of Occupational Therapy (MOT) Program at a single university. Of the sample, 82% passed and 18% failed their first NBCOT test trial. Considered independently, preadmission recommendation letters and writing sample scores, graduate MOT program GPA, lack of MOT program difficulty, fieldwork self-reports, and gender predicted NBCOT certification examination outcomes. When considered together in logistic regression models predicting outcome, this combination of factors correctly predicted 86.2% of student outcomes (or 20% to 32% of the variance in certification examination success), with OT program GPA and preadmission recommendation scores predicting unique outcome variance. This information may be helpful to admissions committees as well as to occupational therapy faculty as they identify strategies and practices to facilitate first-time test taking success on the NBCOT certification examination. Keywords certification examinations, predictors, student outcomes Cover Page FootnoteThe authors would like to acknowledge the assistance of Katlyn Long Salac, OTR/L and Lauren Harvey, OTR/L with this project. Complete Author ListSharon D. Novalis, Jill M. Cyranowski, and Cathy D. Dolhi This topics in education is available in The Open Journal of Occupational Therapy: https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/ojot/vol5/iss4/ 9All entry-level occupational therapy (OT) There is an abundance of literature related to academic selection criteria and their relationship to The Open Journal of Occupational Therapy, Vol. 5, Iss. 4 [2017], Art. 9https://scholarworks.wmich.edu/ojot/vol5/iss4/9 DOI: 10.15453/2168-6408.1341the PANCE and determined gender as a predictor of success (with males being more successful than females).Although strong graduate-level academic performance is consistently associated with future success on certification examinations, the predictive value of other criteria is variable. The intent of the current study was to explore the relationship among Sample Characteristics Preadmission FactorsTo be considered for admission to the MOT program under study, applicants were typically required to have a cumulative undergraduate GPA of 3.0 or higher on a 4.0 scale. This requirement was also applied to prerequisite course performance in human anatomy with lab, physiology with lab, abnormal psychology, lifespan development, and statistics or research methods.Applicants were also required to secure three letters of recommendation from aca...
Although these eight orthopedic (hip) critical pathways included occupational therapy benchmarks, further development and definition of the role of occupational therapy within subsequent orthopedic (hip) critical pathways is needed.
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