A few summers ago, Anna Moloney was a new college graduate gearing up for a teaching career. 今年夏天, she graduated from 和记棋牌娱乐 with a master’s degree, 她对自己事业的展望也大不相同.
“我感觉得到了支持和支持, “不管你要去哪里, 不管你在做什么, 和记棋牌娱乐都在你身边,’”莫洛尼谈到她在和记棋牌娱乐的学生经历时说. “这感觉就像你是一个人，而不仅仅是一个学生.”
Anna Moloney recently completed a summer internship at Bethany Children’s Health Center as p艺术 of the requirement to finish her master's degree at Northwest in therapeutic recreation. (提交的照片)
本月，居住在哥斯达黎加的莫洛尼完成了她的任务 master’s degree in therapeutic recreation through 西北在线.
She capped her coursework with a summer internship at Bethany Children’s Health Center, a pediatric rehabilitation hospital in Oklahoma that further solidified her decision to enter the therapeutic rec field. 她在一系列护理项目中工作, from practicing developmental play with infants and toddlers to assisting teenagers heal from major surgeries or traumatic injuries caused by viruses, 车祸和枪声.
Moloney是使用游戏的治疗团队的一员, 艺术, technology and other forms of recreation to help their young patients do things that people outside of the hospital setting often take for granted – such as walking or lifting an arm.
One teenager with a brain injury had difficulty standing up and walking during physical traditional therapy sessions, Moloney回忆.
“And then he’d come to our therapy and we’d be playing Wii sports, 他会站起来玩,”她说。. “对他来说, 只是好玩而已, and we were able to tackle a lot of those things that other therapies wanted to be doing. 因为那是娱乐，而且很有趣, it was able to help him go home and do all those things that he needs to do.”
After all, it was a traumatic experience of her own that led Moloney to Northwest.
In 2021, Moloney completed her bachelor’s degree in special education at a different university but realized during her student teaching that being a schoolteacher was not the career path she wanted. 她对户外娱乐的热情从未停止过, 虽然, and she went to work that summer as a guide at Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming.
“I went there thinking it was my last big summer adventure before I st艺术ed my professional life, and it turned into a summer of questioning a lot of things and what I wanted to do,”她说。.
Anna Moloney spent a summer working as a guide at Grand Teton National Park in Wyoming – an experience that motivated her to seek a master's degree in therapeutic recreation.
她在大提顿当向导的最后几天, 莫罗尼又计划了一次冒险, 结果很糟糕. 她的妹妹和一个朋友也在做导游, it had been a goal of theirs to summit Mount Owen – the second-highest peak in the park at nearly 13,在夏天结束之前，就能到达1000英尺. 他们在八小时内成功地爬上了这座山, 但是，一场即将来临的风暴加快了他们下山的脚步. The group tried taking a faster route down the mountain and came to a glacier.
跟在成功航行的同伴后面, Moloney slid from the ice and was tossed into a canyon to tumble down the rocky landscape. 她的Garmin手表显示她坠落的速度为每小时37英里.
这次跌倒给她留下了割伤、骨折和脑损伤. She also landed in an area where rescuers could not immediately reach her – which meant Moloney and her companions had little choice but to carry out a self-rescue during the ensuing 17 hours.
Anna Moloney gained profession-based experience with Pure Life Adventure, 她在一个治疗项目中担任向导, 教冲浪, 并带领漂流和背包旅行.
当她从磨难中恢复过来的时候, 身体和精神, 莫洛尼感到有一种冲动驱使他去追求娱乐疗法. She found Northwest during an internet search of potential programs and applied because it was one of the few universities that checked the boxes she wanted to fill for a master’s degree experience.
在雇主提供的奖学金的帮助下, 那年秋天，她开始通过西北在线学习课程.
经历了事故的创伤, Moloney quickly connected with course concepts and fundamentals of emotional, 社会, 认知和身体健康, with an interest in helping others maximize their quality of life.
“I think being in rec therapy and studying it afterward really helped me,” Moloney said. “That experience – and now being a rec therapist – set me up to also help my patients because of my understanding of what it feels like.”
Moloney appreciated the ways Northwest’s online program offered her flexibility and freedom to explore her interests in therapeutic recreation – while applying things she was learning in her coursework.
One project that left a lasting impact on Moloney tasked students with identifying and analyzing recreational therapy programs in their respective locales. 莫罗尼研究的是特奥会, 艺术节目, 和纯粹的生活冒险, 一个为挣扎的青少年和年轻人提供的治疗项目. The latter led to an initial invitation to join the program as a guide for six months, but Moloney continued as a guide for two years while pursuing her master’s degree.
另外, Pure Life gave her opportunities to teach surfing and lead rafting and backpacking experiences.
“(Northwest) provided the flexibility to be able to do so much more experiential learning than I would have had if I was on campus,”她说。. “对我来说，这真的是完美的选择.”
现在, 她的硕士学位课程已经完成, Moloney hopes to establish a rec therapy program in Costa Rica. She is grateful for the ways Northwest faculty supported her goals throughout the degree program – not just within her coursework but by providing resources and helping her develop connections that will last long after her graduation.
