{"id":4755,"date":"2020-02-28T10:14:32","date_gmt":"2020-02-28T15:14:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/?p=4755"},"modified":"2020-10-15T15:09:56","modified_gmt":"2020-10-15T19:09:56","slug":"second-year-occupational-therapy-student-daniel-cowans-combines-passions-for-farming-and-for-people","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/second-year-occupational-therapy-student-daniel-cowans-combines-passions-for-farming-and-for-people\/","title":{"rendered":"Second-Year Occupational Therapy Student Daniel Cowan Combines Passions for Farming and for People"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"text-align: center\">\n<!-- iframe plugin v.5.2 wordpress.org\/plugins\/iframe\/ -->\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" title=\"featured video\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/80XsfpKKzvs?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" 0=\"allowfullscreen&gt;&lt;\/iframe\" scrolling=\"yes\" class=\"iframe-class\"><\/iframe>\n\n<p>Second-year <a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy<\/a> student Daniel Cowan&#8217;s combined passions for farming and working with people led him to pursue a career in occupational therapy.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"attachment_4756\" class=\"thumbnail wp-caption alignright\" style=\"width: 210px\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-4756 size-medium\" src=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-200x300.jpg\" alt=\"Daniel Cowan\" width=\"200\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-200x300.jpg 200w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-683x1024.jpg 683w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-768x1152.jpg 768w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-1024x1536.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-1365x2048.jpg 1365w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-600x900.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-scaled.jpg 1707w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/><figcaption class=\"caption wp-caption-text\">Daniel Cowan<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Cowan owns and operates <a href=\"http:\/\/redtailgrains.com\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener noreferrer\">Red Tail Grains<\/a> in Orange County, North Carolina.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I&#8217;ve always been drawn to physical work,&#8221; Cowan said. &#8220;I find it very fulfilling on the farm.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Cowan said he found being part of a larger institutional system fulfilling, but he was also drawn to working intentionally with people.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cEvery OT, every practicing OT that I ever met, loved their job and was always really happy with it,&#8221; Cowan said. &#8220;That was a good sign to me.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>Cowan explained he began to learn more about the field of occupational therapy and the division&#8217;s holistic approach to health care.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;As humans, we&#8217;re not just bodies; we&#8217;re not just minds, but we have this complex interaction that&#8217;s happening in our minds, in our psychology.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>During the program, Cowan had the opportunity to travel internationally. During fall 2019, he traveled to Malawi as part of clinical fieldwork. The three-month trip challenged him to reflect on his way of thinking, which Cowan described as based in Western culture.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;While I could have said that before I went, I now feel that in a more visceral way,&#8221; Cowan said.<\/p>\n<p>He also said the trip opened his eyes to more aspects of health care, including mental health and medical systems both in the United States and abroad.<\/p>\n<p>Cowan said the master&#8217;s degree program has given him skills in critical thinking and the language he needed to take his future work as an occupational therapist into a variety of realms.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;Simply by having the degree, I now have the opportunity to explore so many different populations, and different fields and institutions,&#8221; Cowan said. &#8220;I was just really taken by the philosophy of this program.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><em>Nancy Bagatell, PhD, FAOTA, is the division director. The master&#8217;s program is ranked #9 in the country according to U.S. News &amp; World Report. The division is housed in the Department of Allied Health Sciences.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Second-year Division of Occupational Science and Occupational Therapy student Daniel Cowan&#8217;s combined passions for farming and working with people led him to pursue a career in occupational therapy. Cowan owns and operates Red Tail Grains in Orange County, North Carolina. &#8220;I&#8217;ve always been drawn to physical work,&#8221; Cowan said. &#8220;I find it very fulfilling on &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/second-year-occupational-therapy-student-daniel-cowans-combines-passions-for-farming-and-for-people\/\" aria-label=\"Read more about Second-Year Occupational Therapy Student Daniel Cowan Combines Passions for Farming and for People\">Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55977,"featured_media":4756,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"layout":"","cellInformation":"","apiCallInformation":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4755","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","odd"],"acf":[],"featured_image":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-scaled.jpg","featured_image_medium":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-200x300.jpg","featured_image_medium_large":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-768x1152.jpg","featured_image_large":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-683x1024.jpg","featured_image_thumbnail":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/559\/2020\/02\/Cowan_headshot-150x150.jpg","featured_image_alt":"Daniel Cowan","category_details":[{"name":"News","link":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/category\/news\/"}],"tag_details":[],"_links_to":[],"_links_to_target":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55977"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4755"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4755\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4756"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4755"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4755"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.med.unc.edu\/healthsciences\/ocsci\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4755"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}