Within the field of occupational therapy various innovative strategies have been used to provide students with effective clinical education (fieldwork) opportunities. One of the more unusual strategies involves the student participating in a placement at a site where there is no occupational therapist and no well-defined role. The University of Alberta, Canada developed and piloted a new fieldwork supervisory position. Feedback was collected from both the sites and students to explore the impact of this position on the fieldwork experience for stakeholders. As well, sites and students were asked to give their opinions on more general aspects of these placements. Both sites and students positively endorsed the fieldwork educator for independent community placement's role. Most recommendations for improvement revolved around increasing the time dedicated to this position and making it permanent. Caution must be taken in generalizing the results of this study, as there may be various considerations that make this an appropriate supervision strategy in Alberta, Canada but not in other locations. Further research is required to determine whether this supervision strategy could be used with other students or professions in other locations.

This paper describes the development of an instrument designed to examine the level of confidence of occupational therapy students during their fieldwork experiences. Confidence in this context refers to Bandura's concept of self-efficacy in Social Cognitive Theory. As this subject has received little formal study, no appropriate tool was found to measure confidence in students. The purpose of this study was to design a measure to provide students with an opportunity to self-assess their levels of confidence both within a placement and throughout their entire fieldwork experiences. The instrument was constructed in three phases: I--Instrument Development; II--Instrument Testing; 111--Instrument Implementation. In Phase III, the instrument was distributed to all students entering the first year of occupational therapy studies at the University of Alberta. Data was collected from these students during their four fieldwork placements to address the questions of whether confidence increases during a fieldwork placement regardless of placement level, whether confidence increases by placement level, and whether student or placement characteristics affect levels of confidence. Results of the study support the hypotheses that confidence levels increase both during a fieldwork placement and with successive placements. Reliability and validity analyses indicated that the measure may be a useful tool to assess confidence in students during fieldwork placements.

A Canadian occupational therapy organisation has recognised exceptional student supervision for practice placements by giving awards since 1990. Students have voluntarily nominated their practice placement educator by writing a statement outlining why the educator deserved the award. To determine the student's perspective on what qualities make an exceptional educator, the researchers analysed the 103 nominations using thematic analysis. Four primary themes emerged from the data, namely creating a positive learning environment, facilitating learning, being a role model and having a positive effect on the student. Although this study focused on the exceptional practice placement educator, the findings are relevant to anyone striving to improve the quality of the practice placement learning experience.

The results of this study can be used to guide curriculum development, to aid students making decisions regarding fieldwork, and to offer insight to new graduates or therapists seeking employment.