From Bachelor’s to OTD
Advance Your Career
Your bachelor’s is more than just a degree, it’s your ticket to a new & rewarding career in Occupational Therapy. SCU’s hybrid-accelerated Doctor of Occupational Therapy Program combines the convenience of online coursework with the groundbreaking, innovative, and high quality education that you would expect from a premier health sciences university. Our focus on ingenuity, integrative medicine and client-centered care is intended to produce trailblazers that advance efforts in occupational justice and lead in collaborative, interprofessional practice.
Application Deadlines:
June 6, 2025 for September 2, 2025 Start
No GRE, Observation Hours, or Letters of Recommendation required
The admission requirements and other qualifications include:
- U.S. bachelor’s degree or higher from a regionally accredited college or university with a minimum GPA of 3.0 or higher
- Completion of Core Science and General Prerequisites
- Completions of personal statement through OTCAS
- Admissions Committee interview
70% Online Coursework with 30% in-person Lab Immersions at SCU’s Phoenix Metro Campus in Year 1 and 100% experiential in Year 2 with Capstone & Fieldwork placement
Build Your Community
Occupational therapy enables people to comfortably perform everyday activities like bathing, eating, going to school or work, engaging in physical activity, enjoying a hobby, and other tasks that make life meaningful. With your OTD from SCU, you’ll have a unique opportunity to impact the community, helping people overcome challenges and regain independence. The OTD-Phoenix Metro program brings together students from across the country to work side-by-side learning the art of occupational therapy and exploring how it can be used to improve the quality of life for all communities.
Change Lives
The key to changing lives is to start with your own. Our program is designed to prepare today’s students for the healthcare system of tomorrow through education, services, scholarship, and clinical experiences that are evidence based and outcomes focused. Our values include occupation and client-focused care, evidence-based practice, and integrative healthcare. Our curriculum will make you a master of these concepts in as little as two years. Take control of your life and begin a career dedicated to enabling others to do the same.
Accreditation Statement
The entry-level occupational therapy doctoral degree program has applied for accreditation and has been granted Candidacy Status by the Accreditation Council for Occupational Therapy Education (ACOTE) of the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA), located at 7501 Wisconsin Avenue, Suite 510E, Bethesda, MD 20814. ACOTE’s telephone number c/o AOTA is (301) 652-AOTA and its web address is www.acoteonline.org.
The program must have a preaccreditation review, complete an on-site evaluation, and be granted Accreditation Status before its graduates will be eligible to sit for the national certification examination for the occupational therapist administered by the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy (NBCOT). After successful completion of this exam, the individual will be an Occupational Therapist, Registered (OTR). In addition, all states require licensure in order to practice; however, state licenses are usually based on the results of the NBCOT Certification Examination. Note that a felony conviction may affect a graduate’s ability to sit for the NBCOT certification examination or attain state licensure.