The mission of Carroll College is to provide a superior educational opportunity to students, which is grounded in the liberal arts tradition and focused on career preparation and lifelong learning. The aim of the Physical Therapy Program at Carroll College is to produce clinicians, trained for general practice in a dynamic health care environment, who provide best care, respectful of patient/client values, grounded in evidence-based practice and clinical reasoning and who contribute to the profession and their community. To this end, the Physical Therapy Program considers the current and anticipated needs of society, the profession, Carroll College, faculty, and students in the pre-professional and professional phases of the program.

Graduates of the Physical Therapy Program are reflective, adaptable, accountable, and competent to render independent judgments within a framework of collaborative health care. Graduates are prepared to practice in a caring, compassionate way with moral sensitivity, social responsibility, and awareness of individual differences. Pre-professional education is grounded in the liberal arts and the natural, behavioral, and social sciences. Professional preparation is in the basic sciences, behavioral sciences, applied sciences, health sciences, and the science of physical therapy. Graduates are prepared to examine, evaluate, diagnose, make prognoses, provide interventions, and re-examine to assess outcomes to prevent the onset, symptoms, and progression of impairments, functional limitations, and disabilities that may result from diseases, disorders, or injuries. Understanding professional practice expectations and patient/client management expectations as well as practice management expectations allow graduates to impact health care delivery systems in their communities. Graduates have a life-long commitment to self-directed learning and critical inquiry recognizing that completion of their professional education is the first phase on a continuum of phases to mastery in physical therapy. Graduates contribute to the profession and society by seeking and disseminating knowledge gained and providing pro bono services.

The curriculum is developed around four tracks, incorporating both traditional and problem-based learning concepts and culminating with true problem-based learning experiences in the form of case reports. Each track is composed of courses that find their foundations in the same basic or professional science. The professional track presents material in a manner that develops content from general to specific, and from basic to applied concepts in professional practice, patient/client management, and practice management. The neurological, musculoskeletal, and general medicine tracks present basic science, applied science in the absence of pathology, and applied science in the presence of pathology within the context of patient care. Across and within the four tracks are common themes that are based upon values that the faculty embraces. These values include:

• Ethical inquiry and practice as outlined in the Physical Therapy Code of Ethics and applied in the academic and professional arenas.
• Continuous integration of theory and practice across the curriculum.
• Self-management of the learning process by the students, whereby the students become capable of and responsible for actively educating themselves.
• Self-reinforcement whereby the students learn and progress not because of external rewards, but because they value their growing competence.
• Faculty and students share a unified vision regarding the curriculum and the profession.

The curriculum includes both didactic content and practical experiences. As an entry-level program, both baccalaureate and post-baccalaureate teaching techniques are employed in the presentation of materials. There is collaborative teaching within and across the tracks and the courses with planned redundancy of subject matter. Constant reinforcement of content with clinical experiences occurs through observations of and exposure to patients in academic courses, exposure to clients in the Physical Therapy Program’s Teaching Laboratory Practice, and integrated clinical education. Best care, from basic to entry-level that is respectful of patient/client values and grounded in evidence-based practice and clinical reasoning, is developed through an integrated series of clinical decision making courses. To foster student responsibility for learning, each week formal class time is limited to twenty-five hours, each faculty member maintains designated office hours, and students participate in weekly out of class skill practice, a portion of which is supervised by laboratory assistants. Texts, articles, videos, lectures, discussions, seminars, laboratories, and technology-based instruction are used to present subject matter. To promote peer learning and peer mentoring, multiple methods are utilized including student faculty rounds, group projects, and clinical cases. To ensure that the entry-level Physical Therapy Program is reflective of optimal practice, faculty performance, ongoing self, student, peer, program, and professional assessment occurs regularly.

To meet our educational mission the Physical Therapy Program utilizes a variety of individuals including, but not limited to academic and clinical physical therapists; other professionals; basic, behavioral, and social scientists; patients and care givers; and the community. Academic and clinical faculty facilitate learning, serve as resources, and share their content expertise in their area of specialization, allowing intra-disciplinary and inter-disciplinary instruction. They are also responsible for the design, implementation, and evaluation of the professional curriculum. The academic faculty members participate in other Carroll College undergraduate departments in the design, implementation, and evaluation of the pre-professional curriculum.

Adopted by the Entry-Level Physical Therapy Program Faculty in November, 1995
Revised and Approved in July 1996, February 1998, March 1999, January 2000, January 2001, August 2002, January 2004