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Major gaps exist in the documented history of occupational therapy in Ireland. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to filling these gaps by providing an overview of three major transitions in Irish occupational therapy in the century preceding the opening of St. Joseph?s College of Occupational Therapy in 1963. Research on occupational therapy’s past is valuable not only for recording and commemorating key events and individuals but also for allowing reflection on and questioning of contemporary practice and assumptions.

This descriptive paper draws on multiple documentary sources to present an overview of the first 100 years of the use of occupation as therapy/occupational therapy in Ireland from 1863 to 1963.

Three major transitions in occupational therapy in Ireland are presented: from moral treatment and the use of occupation as therapy to medical patronage of occupational therapy, from medical patronage to the early/pre-professional era and finally from the pre-professional era to the era of professionally qualified occupational therapists. To illustrate these transitions, a small number of individuals and their contributions are discussed including Dr Eamon O’Sullivan, Dr Ada English, Donal Kelly, Olga Gale and Ann Beckett.

This paper charts the foundations upon which the currently thriving profession of occupational therapy are built. The Association of Occupational Therapists of Ireland recently celebrated their 50th anniversary (AOTI, 2015a), and in 2017, it is 100 years since occupational therapy was formalised in Clifton Springs, New York, USA. Occupational therapy is a relatively young profession, and great opportunities exist to research its history in Ireland to capture the memories and experiences of the pioneers who laid the foundation of the profession as well as to situate the development of the profession in the broader social, cultural and scientific contexts within which it developed.

Cultural heritage and memory are essential mechanisms for the formation of individual and group identity, contributing to a sense of belonging in society. More specifically, built heritage (the buildings, structures and monuments associated with our cultural history) reflect our individual and collective decisions about what is important to preserve and remember into the future, further shaping our identities as citizens of Waterford. Thus, our relationship with heritage is just as much about looking forward into our social imagination for the future of Waterford city as it is about reflecting on our past.

Sites of Conscience are a specific type of built heritage which signify a society's belief that by remembering difficult pasts we can interrogate our current lived realities and create meaningful change in the future (International Coalition for Sites of Consciousness, 2022). Sites of Conscience are akin to what French historian Pierre Nora (1989) referred to as ‘les lieux de mémoire’, or places of memory. These physical spaces can connect past traumas and struggles to our present lives. As places of memory which ask us to acknowledge the past, Sites of Conscience can prevent the erasure of historical traumas and stand as an act of restorative justice, providing safe spaces for citizens to engage with difficult memories.

One such site of conscience in Waterford is the complex of buildings located at the College Street Campus of the South East Technological University. The site comprises the former convent of the Congregation of Our Lady of Charity of the Good Shepherd of Angers (commonly known as the Good Shepherd Sisters); the St Mary's Good Shepherd (Magdalene) Laundry; and St Dominick's Industrial School. The site was occupied in 1884 and the Laundry operated until its closure in 1982 (Department of Justice, 2013). This chapter will consider the former Magdalene Laundry and Industrial School's cultural and heritage significance to Waterford as a site of conscience, which encourages the citizens of Waterford not only to connect our past to our present, but to connect these memories to current actions to create a more just society into the future.

The built heritage of this complex acts as a powerful memory aide of a shared local history, allowing citizens to connect this past to related contemporary human rights issues. In this way, the former Laundry and Industrial School can stimulate discussions on gendered violence today, or to interrogate modern forms of institutionalisation such as Direct Provision. The chapter will further consider how these connections are even more important when our need to remember and recognise past atrocities are met with social, political, economic or cultural pressure to forget. Sometimes the desire for erasure is understandable; we want to commit events to the past and move on. However, such erasure can further disempower survivors of these institutions; prevent current and future generations from learning critical lessons; and dismantle future opportunities for healing and reconciliation. In this context, Sites of Conscience offer an opportunity to connect a difficult past to visions of a more socially just city of the future.

Over the last several decades, the social movement sector in the United States has been professionalizing, creating a large number of highly professionalized, formal social movement organizations. And yet, over the last decade, digital technologies have been used to undermine long-settled distinctions between producers and consumers in a number of areas of social and economic life as relative amateurs engage in production (e.g., citizen journalism). Drawing an analogy between protest organizers and producers on the one hand, and protest participants and consumers on the other hand, it would seem possible that digital technologies could be used to up-end brightline distinctions between organizers and participants in the protest sector as well. I outline two different ways these prosumptive forces could shape protest and then use a five year panel dataset on websites across 20 different social movement areas to understand the net effect of prosumptive versus professionalizing trends. Findings suggest that while there has been some adoption of disruptive digital technologies by protest-related websites, the majority of sites still limit and circumscribe participant participation to pre-choreographed actions. Findings shed important light on the continuing social organization of protest in the dawning of the digital age.

The purpose of this paper is to identify how current administrative interns enrolled in a university administrator preparation program describe and make meaning of their internship experiences.

For this qualitative study, the researchers interviewed administrative interns enrolled in one university preparation program throughout their internship regarding the experiences.

The findings from this study contribute and add value to research in the area of administrator preparation by highlighting the experiences of administrative interns as well as the implications of how interns make meaning of those experiences using a developmental concerns framework. Key factors influencing those perceptions cited by interns as a result of their internship experiences include the interns’ readiness to take on leadership positions, their change in perception of administration, perceptions of journal reflections as an internship component, supporting teachers, receiving feedback from others, and the level of support provided by their internship supervisor.

The findings from this study contribute to research in the area of administrator preparation at the university level, specifically pertaining to the structure of the internship, how university preparation programs can respond to interns’ concerns, and the design and emphasis of practicum experiences within those degree or certificate programs.