Overview 2022
Location
Commonwealth Supported and Full Fee Paying places available (check your Letter of Offer for details)
This course may not be available to international students. Please see the International Online Course Guide (PDF 1.4 MB) for courses that are offered to international students
The Master of Occupational Therapy will prepare you to support growth, change and adaptation to improve health outcomes for different people, populations, and communities. Your studies will involve working with clients to help them participate more fully in life by focusing on their strengths.
You will learn how to help people overcome barriers and use alternative techniques to achieve a given task and facilitate skill improvement. Your studies will include community-based projects and authentic experiential learning activities to enable you to develop and apply lean and system thinking skills, and respond to complex health care problems.
This course will ensure you are capable of working with individuals, families, carers, in teams and with other health professionals across a range of settings, including rural and remote areas.
Graduates of the Master of Occupational Therapy will complete the degree equipped with the theoretical and practical skills required to practice as a registered Occupational Therapist.
Course objectives
The Master of Occupational Therapy is designed to set up a new generation of agile health professionals, capable of providing client-centered, quality, and safe health care.
With many graduate job opportunities currently available and anticipated to grow, our objective is to prepare students to be leaders in current and emerging jobs, by forging relationships with communities, mentors and health and social care facilities to apply their skills across sectors.
In preparing for modern practice, students will be digitally equipped, and have the right mindset to become leaders of future health care improvements across private and public practice settings as they develop in their career.
Learning Outcomes
1. Apply core values and principles of occupational therapy to recognise people as occupational beings and use a high level of professionalism and make sound legal, ethical and socially responsible decisions in practice.
2. Identify and apply key theoretical, conceptual practice approaches to safe quality occupational therapy practice.
3. Communicate effectively with people, their families, significant others, and referrers to meet their occupational needs in a culturally appropriate and collaborative manner.
4. Apply evidence-based practice and clinical reasoning to provide occupational therapy for individuals, communities and populations across a range of current and future practice contexts.
5. Demonstrate agility, commitment to ongoing professional development, life-long, self-directed learning and critical reflective practice for working in complex and changing environments.
6. Ability to function as leaders and change agents for occupational therapy profession, and actively drive system reform through inquiry, innovation, research literacy and the translation of research into practice and practice into research.
Practical experience
During your studies, you will:
- Build vital professional skills in client-centered care, quality assurance, evidence-based practice, interprofessional teamwork and leadership through authentic case and problem-based learning.
- Work in an on-campus simulated learning environment, to practice occupational therapy assessment and intervention skills and enhance your clinical reasoning.
- Undertake hands-on learning in real healthcare environments across Tasmania with experienced occupational therapists to learn about contextual aspects of population health and service delivery.
Career outcomes
Allied Health professionals are in high demand across the health sector with employment for occupational therapists projected to increase in Australia by 17.1% by November 2025*.
Our Master of Occupational Therapy will provide you with qualifications that can lead to various job opportunities in Tasmania, Australia and overseas.
As an occupational therapists, you can work across a range of different industries including;
- Acute Care
- Aged Care
- Allied Health
- Community Health
- Disability
- Early Intervention
- Education
- Government
- Health Promotion
- Hospitals
- Mental Health
- Private Industry
- Rehabilitation
- Social Services
*Australian Government Department of Education, Skills and Employment, 2020 Occupational Projections.
Professional Recognition
Once you graduate from this program you will have the knowledge and skills to apply for registration as an occupational therapist in Australia with the Australian Health Practitioner Regulation Agency (AHPRA).
This program is subject to accreditation by the Occupational Therapy Council (A and NZ) and approved by the World Federation of Occupational Therapists.
Course structure
Year One
Globally, health systems are tasked with responding to contemporary challenges and the related disease burden and health needs of their population. This unit takes a systems approach to examine how health systems are designed, the key components, who pays, and…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
This unit introduces the scope of public health practice in the 21st century and the social, political and economic context within which public health practitioners operate. The unit combines theoretical and practical material to assist students to understand the social…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
This unit introduces students to foundational concepts related to joining a regulated profession and practicing in a health discipline. Allied health roles and contexts of professional practice area introduced and situated within the health care system. With a focus on…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 2 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
View all details for CXA705 Becoming an Allied Health Professional
The unit introduces key occupational therapy terminology related to the meaning and value of occupation, and concepts that are foundational to occupational therapy practice. Students will examine the interplay between sociological, psychological and environmental factors that influence health and wellbeing.…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 2 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
View all details for CXA716 Foundations of Occupational Therapy
In this professional experience placement unit students examine different contexts of occupation to situate the concept of occupational assessment, analysis and the process of occupational enablement. Students draw on the concepts and principles of occupational science and apply an evidence-based…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 2 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
This professional experience placement unit further explores concepts associated with occupation and extends student's ability to determine an occupational evaluation and intervention plan to facilitate occupation using the Occupational Therapy Practice Framework and key theoretical approaches to practice. Relevant frameworks,…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 1 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
The unit examines the interactions between people and other elements of a complex system in terms of occupational engagement and performance. The theory, method and principles of human factors science are introduced to situate occupational engagement and performance in a…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 1 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
View all details for CXA719 Systems, Occupation and Engagement
This unit explores how historical, cultural and social elements, as well as previous and contemporary policy frameworks, shape the health and wellbeing of Australia’s Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples today. Cultural safety, self-determination and collaboration are central concepts within…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Accelerated Study Period 3 | ||||
| Cradle Coast | Nursing Study Period 3 | ||||
| Cradle Coast | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Accelerated Study Period 3 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Nursing Study Period 3 | ||||
| Rozelle - Sydney | Semester 2 | ||||
| Rozelle - Sydney | Accelerated Study Period 3 | ||||
| Rozelle - Sydney | Nursing Study Period 3 | ||||
| Hobart | Nursing Study Period 3 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
| Hobart | Accelerated Study Period 3 | ||||
View all details for HGA246 Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health and Wellbeing
Year Two
This unit provides health and human service professionals with the opportunity to critically analyse a range of contemporary leadership frameworks and theories. There is a focus on the exploration and practical application of theories and techniques to improve understanding of…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
View all details for CAM539 Leadership in Health and Human Services
This unit will equip students with an understanding of the research methods used in health disciplines in order to interpret published research, and design research of their own. The Unit content includes the theoretical underpinning of both qualitative and quantitative…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
This unit uses the lifespan continuum to equip students with an understanding of the core knowledge and skills related to conditions associated with motor delay or coordination difficulties; neurological impairment; sensory impairment; attention and behaviour; genetic, intellectual and/or multiple impairments;…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 2 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
This unit consolidates knowledge and skills related to leadership and public health and synthesises them with business skills critical for allied health professionals working in community-based settings or moving into business within health care. Principles of population health are used…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 1 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
View all details for CXA713 Community-Based Practice and Enterprise
This professional experience placement unit further explores concepts associated with occupation and extends student's ability to determine an occupational evaluation and intervention plan to facilitate occupation using the Occupational Therapy Practice Framework and key theoretical approaches to practice. Relevant frameworks,…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 2 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
This unit consolidates knowledge and skills related to professional practice issues and communication in occupational therapy and prepare students to transition to professional practice. A range of professional issues that newly graduated professionals may encounter are explored. Occupational therapy approaches…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 1 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
This unit examines issues of chronicity and complexity as the basis for students to examine the operational aspects of service delivery in the management of clinical populations. Students will examine the role of information and technology in practice including: conducting…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 1 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 1 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 1 | ||||
View all details for CXA722 Chronicity, Complexity and Service Delivery
The unit examines the interactions between people and other elements of a complex system in terms of occupational engagement and performance. The theory, method and principles of human factors science are introduced to situate occupational engagement and performance in a…
Credit Points: 12.5
| Location | Study period | Attendance options | Available to | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Cradle Coast | Semester 2 | ||||
| Launceston | Semester 2 | ||||
| Hobart | Semester 2 | ||||
Entry requirements
Fees & scholarships
Domestic students
Domestic students enrolled in a full fee paying place are charged the Student Services and Amenities Fee but this fee is incorporated in the fees you pay for each unit you enrol in. Full fee paying domestic students do not have to make any additional SSAF payments.
Detailed tuition fee information for domestic students is available at the Domestic Student Fees website, including additional information in relation to a compulsory Student Services and Amenities Fee (SSAF).
Domestic students enrolled in certain postgraduate coursework programs may not be eligible for student payments through Youth Allowance and Austudy. Visit the Department of Social Services website to find out more about eligibility for Centrelink support and the list of eligible courses
International students
International students should refer to the International Students course fees page to get an indicative course cost.
Scholarships
For information on general scholarships available at the University of Tasmania, please visit the scholarships website.
How can we help?
Do you have any questions about choosing a course or applying? Get in touch.
- Domestic
- 1300 363 864
- International
- +61 3 6226 6200
- Course.Info@utas.edu.au
- Online
- Online enquiries