The building block, 07-09/2013, v.7 no.3

              An e-newsletter of the J. D. McCarty Center for children with developmental disabilities
Volume VII, Issue 3
July - September 2013
The T. J. Turner Story
McCarty Center Team Rallies To Transition Patient To College
Determined. Driven.
Motivated. Desire. Independent
minded. Funny. Smart. These are
just some of the descriptors used
by the McCarty Center staff who
helped 18-year-old T. J. Turner
transition from high school
graduate to university freshman;
and they did it in three very fast
weeks.
Turner, who has been
a patient of the McCarty Cen-ter
since he was 7 years-old,
was admitted to the hospital on
July 24 for a period of intensive
therapy and independent living
skills training. During his admis-sion
meeting, he told the staff he
wanted to attend the University
of Oklahoma this fall and major
in broadcast journalism. He had
made application to OU, but
hadn’t received his acceptance
letter yet.
“T. J. has always worked
on independent living skills when
he’s here,” said Maria Greenfi eld,
director of occupational therapy.
“He’s always wanted to be as
independent as possible.”
Turner, whose hometown
is Chickasha, has wanted to go
to OU since he was a freshman
in high school. An internship with
T. J. Turner is all smiles as he begins his college career
in pursuit of a degree in broadcast journalism. Sporting
a class of 2017 T-shirt, Turner has transitioned into col-lege
life with the support of the McCarty Center, OU’s
Disability Resource Center, Oklahoma Department of
Rehab Services, DHS Independent Living Program and
Health Care Innovations.
the Chickasha Leader weekly news-paper
doing general assignment and
sports reporting stoked his interest
in journalism. Sports reporting is of
particular interest to Turner, who is a
self-proclaimed sports nut.
Turner has never met a
stranger. “I like meeting new people
and talking with them. Because I like
to talk, I thought a career in radio
sports broadcasting would be the
way to go for me.”
“As soon as we knew what
T. J.’s goal was, we organized to see
what we needed to do to make it
happen,” Greenfi eld said. “The team
consisted of therapists from speech-language,
occupational and physical
therapy, social work, psych, nursing,
and direct care. Our biggest
challenge was going to be co-ordinating
all of the groups and
agencies involved in getting T. J.
in school and supporting him.”
One of the fi rst calls the
team made was to Dr. Chelle’
Guttery, director of the Dis-ability
Resource Center at OU.
“This woman is awesome,” said
Greenfi eld. “She became
T. J.’s champion and continues
to be. She helped remove all
the barriers, physical and opera-tional,
that T. J. faced getting into
school. I can’t say enough about
this woman.”
Another very helpful re-source
in getting Turner set up
in the Couch Center dorm was
Jenn Doughty, director of opera-tions
at OU housing and food.
“You couldn’t have asked for a
more helpful person in getting T.
J. set up in a proper dorm room
in such a short time frame,” said
Aaron Coolidge, an occupa-tional
therapy student from Texas
Woman’s University in Denton,
Texas. Coolidge was working
with Turner while doing a clinical
rotation at the McCarty Center.
Continued on page 2