We want to support universities and employers of early career occupational therapists to give the best possible introduction to the next generation.

We know that a significant number of occupational therapists leave the profession in their first five years of registration. Introducing early career standards (closely linked to Health Care Professionals Council (HCPC) preceptorship principles) is one action we are taking as part of our Workforce Strategy to support the growth and retention of our profession.

We manage an accreditation process, using our Learning and development standard for pre-registration education to assess occupational therapy pre-registration programmes and ensure quality in their design and delivery. All UK providers of pre-registration education have or are working towards our accreditation. 

There has been considerable growth in pre-registration education in recent years – in both the number of providers and the number and range of programmes. Our current quality assurance mechanisms need a new approach to ensure continued stakeholder confidence in the delivery of effective pre-registration education, supporting quality early career occupational therapists.

We're undertaking a project to re-imagine our quality assurance approach. This project and the review and expansion of the Standards are closely aligned, and programme providers will be kept up to date and supported in the progression of this work.

RCOT members and non-members with an interest and understanding of occupational therapy pre-registration education and early careers. 

Please identify the Education Summit that is most relevant to your area of work/stakeholder role. 

You will be asked to provide us with some information about you. This will include completing our anonymous diversity data collection form, and information about your role. This will help us to understand who is engaging in the Summits and the areas they represent. 

About a week before the Summit, we will send you some preparatory information. At the summit you'll have the opportunity to take part in two topic specific discussion groups. You’ll be asked to choose which two groups you want to join. You’ll also receive some other information to support your thinking and reflections prior to joining the Summit.  

The Summit discussion groups will follow a ‘Start/Stop/Continue/Explore’ structure and will focus on broad topics rather than specific aspects of the Standards.

Our revised Standards will be published in April 2026 and then be reviewed next in 2030. We have an exciting opportunity to think big and bold about the education of our future occupational therapists. How can we best enable them, and those who support their learning to have the skills and attributes needs to be an occupational therapist working in 2030 and beyond? 

The Education Summits are being facilitated by Carolyn Hay, Head of Education, and Samantha Turner, Independent Occupational Therapist and Educator.  

Each discussion group will be facilitated by an RCOT colleague and recorded to ensure we can capture the conversations. 

Please contact our Education team using education@rcot.co.uk