Latest / The STA Clinician Podcast / Ep.294: ‘Sports Therapy: University Degree or Vocational Training?' with Kate Williams and Sarah Catlow

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Ep.294: ‘Sports Therapy: University Degree or Vocational Training?' with Kate Williams and Sarah Catlow · The STA Clinician Podcast

0:00
Hi there, welcome to episode 294 of the SGA Clinician Podcast,
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formerly known as the Sports Therapy Association Podcast.
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I'm your host, Matt Phillips, and as always, this episode was recorded live
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on the Sports Therapy Association YouTube channel and Facebook page at 8 o'clock UK time on a Tuesday.
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I'm just jumping on here now in the introduction to let you know that the quality
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of this particular podcast is not nearly as good as we normally have because
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of some technical issues we had we have,
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put some changes to it to improve the audio and hopefully well i think it's
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kind of listenable although i appreciate that it will cost you a little bit
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more effort it's as good as i could get it so,
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do bear with us hopefully it is good enough for you if you prefer you can go
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over to youtube where i have uploaded an audiogram where you've got the audio
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along with the transcript of it which i think can help a lot of people because
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you can actually see the words whilst you're listening to it.
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So that's on the Sports Therapy Association YouTube channel.
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So yeah, there we go. Apologies in advance, but this is episode 294,
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which is entitled Sports Therapy, University Degree or Vocational Training
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with special guest Sarah Catler, Chair of the Sports Therapy Organization,
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STO, Kate Williams, Head of Education for the Society of Sports Therapists,
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SST, and also with me was Gary Benson, founder of the STA. I do hope you enjoy.
1:39
Hello. How are you doing? And Kate Williams. Hello. And Gary Benson.
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Are you doing all? There we go. Easy to sing with the voices now.
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Wonderful. For people listening to the podcast, I thought, because we've been
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on the show before, and also we had a wonderful time together,
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so if you show, and people can check out, you know, look into the SST and the
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STO and the STA, I thought we might just jump straight into it.
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Yeah, it needs time. I've got to be happy with that. Yeah.
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Okay. I'm glad you said that, because I haven't got anything else going down
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here apart from that. No.
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What we'll do then, A million pound question. We put it in the title.
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Hopefully we've hooked some people in.
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Is sports therapy really a case of university degree versus vocational training?
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Or is that a false debate? Claire Williams, what do you think?
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I think it's a bit of a false debate. And...
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I just want to say kind of from the outset here that I'm probably not the stereotype people might expect.
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I'm head of education for the SST. We have 57 universities, 44 degree programs.
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And you might assume that I'm going to come through the university route,
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but actually I'm a level four sports massage diploma, level five sports therapy diploma.
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And after working within those for quite a while, the jobs that I really wanted
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to get were requiring of a degree.
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So I went back and did a master's in sports therapy. So because of that background,
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I don't see it as a one or the other.
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I don't see it as vocational education versus university education.
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I think I've experienced both. I've benefited from both.
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And they have such a value in a place. I think the way that I see it,
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probably the way the SST sees it, is that they all sit on some sort of qualifications ladder.
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And that ladder, each run of that ladder represents a different kind of professional
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responsibility and, you know, it offers multiple routes into a profession.
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You don't have to all finish at the same spot. You don't have to start at the same spot.
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I think there's value in all of that. I don't know whether Sarah and Gara,
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you would agree with that.
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No, I do agree. I think there is pros and cons for each, for university degrees
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and vocational courses.
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I think I mean I've been a university lecturer for I want to say at 25 years
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so I've only been in that environment but obviously I have a great understanding of vocational courses,
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our university which is obviously accredited by the STO our degree we sell it
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as a vocational degree course so we still use that word when we start because
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we are teaching them the skills to go into a workplace,
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and obviously we teach them a lot more skills we haven't for three years we
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teach them all the sport therapy skills but we also teach them the softer skills
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like leadership communication,
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business and everything like that but we do use the word vocational when we
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sell degree at Oakland A's or anything like that.
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I'd be interested in where Kate did her Level 5 diploma and whether it was on
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a framework, because if you look at the regulated qualification framework,
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there are very few vocational sport therapy qualifications on there.
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A lot of what does exist is what could be regarded as an in-house certificate and and
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and as Sarah mentioned pros and cons you know one of the pros of an in-house
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certificate might mean that as the evidence information changes a course could
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be updated immediately and not have to go to a you know
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a quite long-winded sort of validation program,
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but the con to that as well is that.
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Often there's no external scrutiny so we don't know what we're getting,
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that that's my concern about the vocational our two have done you know vocational
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and academic qualifications and and that yeah I learned from both but I learned
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some negative things from both as well yeah I think,
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I'm not going to go into where I did my diploma it was 25 years.
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You can tell me later. Yeah exactly and I think we were all speaking before
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we got live on this about there are a lot of really poor vocational qualifications out there that,
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I think we were talking about how quickly you can kind of get to level 5 diploma
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rates without having any backgrounds in it and I think my research said it was
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12 weeks you could get through.
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Gary you said it was a bit sooner than that wasn't it if you did it online yeah so,
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That's really, really scary, I think. And I think for me, the conversation is
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really about standards. It's about assurance of competence and it's about public confidence.
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So we do have a number of kind of nationally recognised qualifications,
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frameworks that all describe sort of different knowledge, skills.
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Autonomy, responsibility.
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I don't see them as competing pathways. I see them on this progression ladder.
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They just prepare practitioners for different roles and different,
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levels of responsibility and it isn't really about which route is better because
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that will vary from individual to individual it's about what level of education
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training and assessment is required for a particular scope of practice I think.
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I agree with you on that but the whole thing is sports therapy is a title,
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you just see it as a title and they don't understand how people can call themselves
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that because it's not protected, whether they come from a university route,
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a vocational route, a weekend course.
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And it's just about educating the public to what is sports therapy.
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What is the difference between a graduate sports therapist and someone that's
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done a weekend course or a vocational kind of very short course?
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Yeah, and again, to come back, to circle back around to something we were chatting
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earlier, you know, there are some courses out there that are all about standards
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and we identify as those, I guess. But then there are other courses out there
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that are all about sales.
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And when you're bordering on mis-selling what your course is allowing people
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to do, it becomes really confusing for a member of the public,
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for prospective clients to kind of differentiate it that way.
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I, well, the SST see a clear distinction between sports massage and sports therapy.
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That might be kind of an open air for you to comment on. Do you see them as,
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one and the same or should they be differentiated more clearly?
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If you use the example, you spoke about the ladder.
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You know, if we look at the national occupational competences,
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the NOS, which are held by a.
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Previously been the will of the industry and all of the stakeholders to get
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involved in producing a new set and i'm aware that the sst has its own set,
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uh and the still has its own set because you are educators you know the sta
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we're not involved in education so we don't have a set of competences,
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but we recognize there should be a set of competences and if you look at sports
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massage one of the 14 competences that are held by skills for health and the
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complementary natural health care council in the,
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sports massage example and that might be run one of the ladder,
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you know there are then 13 other runs which we have to achieve and be assessed
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as being competent you know and some of those can't be done with a simple cpd
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by you know attend a certificate of attendance because there's no
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there's no assessment of competence there so,
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i think that the one One of the advantages that the universities have,
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in my opinion, is the robust accreditation teams that they operate.
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There are examples in vocational training of accreditation being mentioned.
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And when one looks into the accreditation, it's run by a company that's owned
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by the same people from the same address.
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And that, I think, is a conflict of interest. And that's why the FTA made the decision.
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We wouldn't get involved in education so that we could give a wholly independent
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and biased view of what's out there.
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And as a result of that, we don't have to have a set of competences for our
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education side, but we do have a set of competences and skills required for
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memberships that we have minimum eligibility criteria.
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I know I've heard me speak quite a lot about the national occupational standards,
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and I was having a look earlier today about the CNHC sports therapy group of
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units and I just find that they're a really odd mix.
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They're heavily based on passive massager modalities, taping,
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strapping, thermomodalities, electrotherapy and certainly not what we would
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consider to be the core areas of the sports therapy practice.
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And back in the day, undergraduate courses would mention national occupational
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standards in their program specification.
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They would map to it in the same way that they would map to the assurance agency
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subject benchmarks. But I don't know whether you see this as well.
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Even though national occupational standards are still there,
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I feel like they're a lot less influential than they were 10,
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15 years ago. And I think the landscape has changed.
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I think we probably need to be moving towards more of a professional standards framework.
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I think it's more useful, the three dimensions around core knowledge,
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professional values and areas of activity.
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So I don't see national occupational standards as being sufficient anymore to
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be the primary professional framework that we will work to.
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I agree with you. I'm just about to start the journey of really validating a sports therapy degree.
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And we will not mention our national occupational standards at all within our
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degree and within our foundation paperwork.
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We're producing these graduates and we're not going by them so they do need
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to be updated and I have they're not updated,
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They could be experts in the field and then reflect on what's going on there.
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The DNHC, they've done no business in having a set of national occupational
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standards for sports therapy.
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At the very most, they're registered at 154 sports therapists.
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It's down to below 50, I believe, now.
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They did that without consultation. But if you look at the reasons national
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occupational standards were introduced, it was stakeholder led and it was the
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competencies required by input so it's a government,
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scheme the sector skills councils that you know skills active with for the health,
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and fitness industry skills for help with the sort of remedial if you like so we do need a set,
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of competencies and i don't think it's it's right that,
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we all have separate ones it has to be an industry-wide one.
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Otherwise, I don't think that it's of a purpose.
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Yeah, no, I completely agree with you because, again.
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People writing courses they have we have nothing to refer to for the up-to-date
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stuff going on in industry and i'm very believed that we should collaborate
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and write our own standards,
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and with the changes going on in an unregulated unregulated industry you can
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do what you want might grant if you were for the life could cause us call a
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self-support therapist and nobody can stop her,
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you know and this is what i think we're in a better position now than we ever
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have been because we're all here, we're all talking.
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The main stakeholders in the industry.
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So there is a lot at the end of the tunnel where perhaps there haven't been before.
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And I think over the next few years, I think we will be moving towards a single
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set of competencies under what name you want to call them. It probably won't be my decision.
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I think it's the way forward that if we're all singing from the same hymn sheet,
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there would be an expectation that you have to be a member of an association,
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but there's nothing still to stop people.
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The bonds that are out there are not doing CPD, they're not insured,
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they're working outside of a separate practice based on quite a flimsy qualification.
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Someone else asked if there was more,
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collaboration, because, I mean, there's heads of turn here, they're going,
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wow, it's really nice, and what we're doing, like you said, has been really
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cool, because singing from the same imsheet and from different associations, organizations kind of,
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a strongly unified voice, but somebody asked if that is happening and there's
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more unification collaboration,
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does that make the path to regulation and legal involvement from the government
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and things more possible?
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Yes.
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It's a difficult question, isn't it? It really is. And I think if we come together
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as a unified voice, we're all separate organizations.
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We all have, I suppose, our own agendas. But on important matters like this
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to push our profession forward, we should come together and work together.
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And create that document or whatever we need to do so you know we talk about
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individuals don't we yeah i know plenty of operational therapists who are just
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as good as graduates or you know who are excellent absolutely i don't think
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anyone would dispute that,
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but there are kind of excellent practitioners from a range of backgrounds but
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i think instead of looking at what comes off the production line at the end
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as a case in point we need to be looking at i hate this analogy but we We need to look at the factory,
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and the production line itself, because I think that's what it's about.
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If you're calling yourself a sports master or that level three,
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level four, level five sports therapist or a graduate sports therapist,
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that has to mean something in terms of safe, competent practitioner.
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So I feel like whatever we do together I think it should be together
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I think it needs to be a system assurance based thing where we we talk about
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the process that a learner will go through
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to meet a minimum standard of competence does that does that make sense definitely
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it's kind of a secret tonight I want to feed that into a question which was
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going to give you and it'd be nice to hear so would you say that that's one of the strengths,
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as head of education at the FST Would you say that's one of the biggest strengths
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of your kind of educational roots of our universities, the frameworks there?
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I agree with Kate with designing a sports therapy degree.
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You obviously look at industry, what's going on.
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We have to jump through so many hurdles. We have to follow educational conferences.
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For my degree at Plasma John, it will be the STO.
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And then and with obviously we credit foundation degrees and other BSc's and
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it's just having that what do we want our graduate to be when they finish and
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how do we assess that they are content of what they do so yeah,
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I think if I can kind of come in hard with why university oversight is so useful,
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and this is probably the dullest part.
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Of my job, I suppose, but there is quality assurance with university education that comes as standard.
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So we've got independent regulation at government level, the Office for Students,
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obviously, degrees within England, Meddor in Wales and lots of other kind of
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regional. It's got Scottish online learning variations as well.
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We've then got the university's own internal QA processes, which comes everything
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from programme approval through
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to, you know, they have to be revalidated within a five-year cycle.
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They are subject to annual monitoring.
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Every grade that a student gets has to go through an examination board.
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There are processes around first marking, second marking, moderation.
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You know, the assessments have to be designed to be both challenging and authentic.
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So I think academic governance is there in space.
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In addition to the university's internal processes, there is external examiner scrutiny.
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External examiner is a senior lecturer at another institution who comes in to
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review standards, make sure you're marking with fairness and consistency and
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that the grades that you're awarding are comparable across the sector and universities.
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And then on top of that, you've got professional strategy regulated by the accreditation program.
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So we have the ability to impose additions to standard academic regulations.
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And this will include for us things like you have to have 80 percent attendance
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before you're admitted to sit the assessment.
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You have to pass on assessment components. You can't average your major clinical
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competence. Every school has some practice and things like that.
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Once a year, we all lit a single competency across all of our universities to
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get a lie of the land and so on.
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And I think some of the biggest strengths that universities have,
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sorry, and I know I'm on a soapbox now, is that there are fitness to study and
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fitness to practice policies, panels and processes.
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So if you have concerns about a student's conduct, about their professionalism,
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you know, if they're exhibiting unsafe behaviour, that can be flagged,
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investigated and managed through formal university processes.
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There are strict practice based learning requirements around placement and supervision.
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There are safeguarding things in place like students cannot write on place to
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be like ebs or enhanced ebs requirement and i don't think that's true in vocational
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award you can go and log your hours,
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so i think there are a number of quality assurances and oversights that happen in universities that i,
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i think probably missing within vocational training and and that That leads
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me to question, coming back to that factory analogy,
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you know, the ability of that factory to produce very competent practitioners at scale.
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We do, obviously, at our university, do exactly the same as Kate.
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The amount of paperwork that we have to produce, for example,
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placements, we measure are they suitable, are they getting the right experience,
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are they supervised by the right people. You know, all of our students are enhanced DBS.
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If they're working in a certain environment, they're going to do safeguarding,
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you know, and we have exactly the same.
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You know, when we design a degree, I'm about to write my approval and principle.
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And then obviously we go through the validation and well you know it's not just
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the professional body there and it's not me that credits my own degree if anyone says anything
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it's someone else but also we have external people to make sure that what we're
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producing it is correct and.
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And our assessments as well we were having to change all of our assessments
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because of AI so and and how we devise our assessments and you know I think
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we're going back to the old competency tick box kind of thing can you demonstrate
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the skill for us excellent,
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and then doing a professional kind of conversation with them to make sure they
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understand and you don't get that in vocational courses a lot of the times and
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what i would say matt here is that,
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you know i fully take on the the the level that they go to to for this accreditation
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but i want to take that stage further and say do we have the data you know for
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the factory output that we've we're producing, you know,
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so many thousands don't fish a year. How many actually go to work in the industry?
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Are there the jobs there for them?
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Because 87% of the STA members are self-employed in some capacity where I surveyed three years ago.
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If we look at, and we've discussed this before, if we look at the total membership,
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including Basra in this, which is, you know, 12 to 1,400, we're 12 to 1,400.
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I don't know what the STO is, but the SST, when I spoke to Simon,
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was around that 5,000, which, you know, 3,000 and something were student members.
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We're about 8,500 members. We're in the middle of a renewal cycle at the moment.
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So, about 8,000 and 2,500 are full members, if you like.
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No, 2,500 are student members. 2,500 are student members then.
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So, you're going through the renewal process now.
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How many of those students actually will in three years time be working in the
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industry because if you're producing you know two and a half thousand every so,
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many years does your membership go incrementally because you know the
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what i'm hearing on the sort of coalface is that there are no jobs to go to
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and previous stakeholders in the industry were advocating i think 18 months
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on internships and it was yeah.
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Who's invested time and money into their chosen career then working for next
22:37
to nothing you know we see the adverts on social media every day you know do
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you want to get your foot in the door gain valuable experience working in lower
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league football or rugby
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you know where are the jobs for these people that we're producing,
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so i i think i think that's where graduate sport therapist sst becomes a bit of a distinguishing,
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distinctive factor so our members work in the nhs they were as MSK clinicians in the NHS.
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They work in professional sports teams, semi-professional sports teams.
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But yes, a lot of them actually do set up in private practice and go and see
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private clients. We just actually released our guide for graduates setting up
23:14
their own business today, actually. So if you remember, you might have had some
23:17
communication about that.
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I see the jobs that are out there being very much advertised for,
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you know, they need a BSc and they need membership to a specific professional body.
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But why a specific membership body? Because that's discriminatory.
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Why can't it be anybody who meets the competency required for the job on the
23:39
job specification, the person specification, should be able to have equality
23:44
of opportunity irrespective of their membership body?
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And I act on a daily basis where it says you must be VASFAT
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or SST I know you can be any you can't put that down it's it's education you
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know they say oh this is what we recall by the FA so I have conversations with
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the FA to say you know why are you still perpetuating this message,
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but we we have it we have it at the moment it's a,
24:08
job at the moment that advertises for and then you need a degree physiotherapy
24:13
TST and htpc and we've challenged that so you know employers have the right
24:18
to employ whoever they want they have the right to stipulate the,
24:21
the person specification the minimum of essential criteria,
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that's that's at their discretion what we see is that there is there is a,
24:32
there is a different market for a graduate sports therapist than there is for
24:36
diploma and I appreciate that some people listening might not like that and.
24:45
Might not resonate with that.
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I was certainly one of those diplomas who couldn't get the job that I wanted
24:51
because I wasn't in a degree and I went and ticked that box.
24:55
So I think the occupational landscape is different.
25:02
Yeah, no, I agree with you on that. For me, I see lots of jobs coming up,
25:08
and I always have little no's about what they're asking for,
25:11
obviously wages, which are not formally stated.
25:15
But again, you know, one of our graduates, an STO member, is the sports therapist
25:19
for Man United, and he's one of our ex-graduates. So, you know,
25:23
you can still, but then once it's obviously a degree level individual for that.
25:29
But going back to Gary's question about graduates and where do they get employed,
25:34
I can't remember, and Kate will probably remind me, there is a survey that is
25:40
released, I want to say it's by the Office of Students, that will actually tell
25:44
you how many students have a job 18 months after graduating.
25:50
Saying yeah it's a good yes um employability they do it for postgrad as well it's a follower.
25:56
Just just on that note we we speak to all of our final year students
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and i reckon about a third of the time they reach the end of their degree have
26:03
no interest in growing working at the little capacity anywhere they just they
26:08
don't like touching people or they've had enough of feet or they hate to smell
26:10
a wintergreen or whatever it might be,
26:13
but we assure them that they're still walking out with a bachelor of science
26:16
with honors and that means something that that is recognized qualification that
26:21
has a huge amount of transferable skills they'll been in built into it,
26:25
so we do a lot of education and with our students and our new graduates within
26:30
the first five about the other non-client facing,
26:34
occupations that they they can move into and again i don't probably sound very
26:40
biased with this you know that's the difference between walking out with a a
26:44
level four diploma versus a Bachelor of Science with honours or a Master of Science.
26:51
For my for my students it's slightly different so a lot of my students will
26:54
go and work in the world of sports therapy um whether they stay in it is another
26:58
matter a lot of them go on and be postgraduate courses,
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so a lot of my students will go and do a post-grad in sports science just to
27:05
expand their knowledge and understanding in that area but a lot of them will
27:09
set up their own businesses i don't know if it's different in southwest because
27:13
we haven't got loads of sports therapy degrees down here,
27:16
but yeah they they go and set up their own businesses and And obviously,
27:19
within the degree now, we actually teach a support therapy business element.
27:23
And it was the first time it was delivered this year, so it had lots of positive
27:26
outcomes. But yeah, a huge percentage of our students work in the industry down here.
27:31
So just one question to my mind. I don't know if you can say this,
27:34
but you're talking very much about the degree. What percentage of ATO courses is not the degree?
27:40
Most of them. So we accredit one, two, three, four degree level programs. That's it.
27:49
So that's all we do. And then we do accredit other courses as well.
27:54
I mean, the courses you can deliver not to university, maybe not you personally,
27:57
but the SDA have got lots of courses which are non-degree level, yeah?
28:00
Yeah, they have level four and level three, level four, level five.
28:05
And we accredit or endorse some CPD courses as well.
28:09
So what would the, on behalf of the SGA then, what would your reply be to Sarah,
28:13
who's, I must admit, given quite a good argument that if you want to be,
28:18
and I'm reading it this way mainly just to encourage conversation,
28:20
but if you want to go and do a good job, do the degree.
28:24
But people that have level three, level four, level five do very,
28:29
very well in self-employment.
28:31
I know a lot of people with those vocational qualifications are probably making
28:36
more than academic lecturers.
28:37
And they've done that from their own goodwill and their own skills that they
28:42
may have developed. You know, they work with insurance, really successful clinics.
28:47
I have people that have developed multidisciplinary clinics for that degree.
28:52
And making a really good income from that.
28:56
Gary, I want to bring up something. I can't believe Gary said,
28:58
well, this is going to explode suddenly.
29:00
He just can't get his words out. But I want to bring up one thing that you've
29:03
raised before, Gary, is that to a certain extent, helping people in pain,
29:10
one of the factors that can help some life experience, that you've experienced
29:14
some pain in yourself, that you've seen in friends, family, and for instance,
29:17
not in pain, and you've got a bit of experience in that, That tends to come
29:20
a lot of the time with edge.
29:22
Not all people haven't got any of it, but a lot of it does come wisdom with edge.
29:26
But it's one of the cases and the dangers, whether there are mature students,
29:32
and it's okay, you can, you've probably got,
29:34
more data on this than me, but I would imagine that the average age of somebody
29:38
who comes out from a degree is younger than the people who have,
29:43
been doing a degree because they've started at the edges of whatever 40,
29:48
40, 50, but they want to give something back.
29:51
They've got that hours and they've got that knowledge they really want to do
29:54
them like their communication skills.
29:58
Is that an argument for vocational routes that if you start telling people,
30:04
degrees how you're going to get a better job then we're potentially missing
30:07
out on a lot of life experience which could really help do a public out there,
30:13
I think those people those mature students like I was Matt,
30:17
we probably don't want to work in professional support you know we probably
30:21
want to work one-to-one in a clinical environment you know that's where we can
30:26
make the most difference you know i'm not in the slightest motivated by standing pitch side anymore,
30:33
i've done that in freezing cold i've been soaking wet,
30:37
i've been on a bus traveling you know for five hours and it doesn't motivate
30:41
me anymore so i think that is you know you've got to look at the individual
30:46
wanting to study the degree route is,
30:50
more suited to the to the younger generation because it's a there's an expected
30:54
route isn't there now with people go from school to college to university where
30:59
the people you mentioned you know they've put the data in in accountancy,
31:04
or admin or marketing and and they're keen runners or they're proficient uh
31:10
athletes and they want to work with those athletes so i think.
31:16
I think the conversion master's degrees are a really attractive option to people returning to education.
31:25
I certainly wouldn't advocate for someone who is looking to retrain,
31:30
pivot in their career and come into sports therapy.
31:33
Absolutely, an undergraduate degree probably isn't for them.
31:36
But we do have fast-fart master's degrees that would accept a mature student
31:41
from a non-standard background. Maybe academically, you didn't need the energy criteria.
31:46
They can get them through a master's degree, an accredited master's degree.
31:50
We are one that can get you through in just over 12 months of,
31:55
intense study. And we like to talk about it as a route of individual determination
32:01
and that there are some elements that we could give accredited prior learning to.
32:05
So if you've been working as a sportsmaster for 10 years or something,
32:09
that proven track record when you're in business, we're not going to ask you
32:12
to come back and study a soft issue module.
32:16
You've completed that.
32:20
I think universities went through a bit of a phase probably about 15 years ago,
32:23
fast-track degrees, specifically targeting those kind of people who are returning
32:27
to retrain and move in a decent direction.
32:30
They are coming back around as being popular as universities move to larger
32:34
modules and teaching over three semesters seem to be a good value way of getting people through.
32:41
So that might be something else to consider kind of coming up on the horizon as well.
32:47
Is is you mentioned like they could do a year it's that sounded quite intense that's,
32:53
a lot of these people have maybe got dependents on them they can only do part-time
32:57
and yeah it might not be ideal but do you think there's any flexibility or changes in,
33:02
it could improve access for somebody who can only do part-time yeah absolutely
33:06
so a lot of my masters coming back to masters they learn themselves really well
33:09
to this we talk about modules that are stackable,
33:12
so modules that have flexible delivery you do have to come on site but they
33:15
tend to be evenings or weekends lots,
33:18
as we like to call it then you go away for your independent study or theoretical underpinning,
33:23
and things like that then you come back on site,
33:26
for the practical elements and they are pick up put down you know you might
33:30
come for part of a module come for a whole module,
33:34
go away again and then come back a year later and pick up another another module
33:38
and just stack them up and just slowly slowly,
33:42
increase the the breadth of your scope and also the depth,
33:47
of your scope and just slowly build those credits towards getting that graduate
33:51
status last my question from mr becca to go into it from this,
33:56
Is there bad degrees out there? Are there bad masters going to do that?
33:59
Is there the same sort of problem?
34:01
There's no legal requirements the universities have to do? That's the question.
34:07
Aren't there bad degrees out there in sports therapy?
34:08
There are non-accredited degrees that will not tell you that they are non-accredited.
34:13
Sarah probably is all over this as well.
34:16
Effectively, wrap up a level four massage diploma in a three-year undergraduate
34:22
degree and at the end of that three-year degree
34:25
you come out with a level four massage diploma no scope of practice for any
34:28
of the other things that you might have been taught and these students are just
34:32
left utterly disillusioned and saddled with a huge amount of debt
34:36
and you know shattered expectations around where this degree is going to take them and I find they.
34:44
One thing we tell our universities to mention on an open day is that this is
34:48
an accredited degree and what that means your eligibility your scope of practice
34:52
clearly defined you know the other because there,
34:55
are so many students just going to university because they want to live in a
35:00
certain name yeah they like the track suit you know they like the campus feel
35:04
and they just don't look into these things so I don't know whether you you experience
35:08
that as well no I do we thought that we've been,
35:11
we're accredited as well and what it means to students and even when students
35:15
come to us for open day you kind of explain you know go and check out the other
35:19
universities but these are the important things to look out for,
35:22
and maybe an 18 17 18 year old doesn't realize that the parents definitely do,
35:28
with that but one thing that I just want to mention that I was actually discussing
35:32
today about sports therapy,
35:34
is apprenticeship degrees so,
35:37
we were discussing a lot about nursing how to be a nurse it was a diploma then
35:41
it was the degree and then it was an apprenticeship and some of the physio courses
35:46
are going down apprenticeship routes and maybe sports therapy need to look at that as well.
35:52
It's something that we're looking at it's incredibly difficult Sarah that I'm
35:55
happy to share with you the the groundwork that we've been doing in that but,
36:00
It's going to be a huge cultural shift. Well, can I say that the reason that
36:05
the nursing and the physiotherapies are apprenticeship degrees is because it
36:08
gives a cheap workforce to the NHS and it's a huge workforce to the NHS.
36:12
We don't unfortunately have that same quantitative opportunity for employed
36:17
roles at the moment in sports therapy.
36:19
But what I would say, looking upon Kate's point about the degrees that mask
36:27
themselves up as being something that they're not, that happens in vocational training.
36:31
We've got vocational trainers now who are advertising and saying that they've
36:36
got their graduation program with full caps and gowns and it's a level six program
36:41
and there's a research module, it doesn't make it a degree.
36:45
And people are signing up to this.
36:47
It's the same with Masters.
36:50
If you do Masters diploma, people then think that they're eligible to apply
36:54
for MSc-level job role. If you read my website, we don't accept that.
36:59
No, no. But it is. It's mis-selling, isn't it? It is, yeah.
37:04
But, you know, one could argue that, you know, and I know two people who are
37:09
taking legal action on this, But sometimes the degree can be mis-selling.
37:14
If they're told by their university that there's a £50,000 job at Everton and
37:18
they're waiting at the end of the course, and that job might exist,
37:21
but you're not going to get it because you have to work your way through the
37:25
football network, if you like.
37:26
So, you know, we've all got crosses to bear.
37:30
We've all got things that we need to work hard on. I think that the starting
37:34
point is now. You know, we're all collaborating.
37:38
And if I may Matt I want to just sort of you know preempt,
37:42
something if sports therapy now if we were all in agreement and we weren't previously
37:48
because some of the stakeholders run courses which would be inappropriate,
37:54
if there was a in the future or regulation so they would never vote for it if
37:59
we were all to vote for regulation now there would be a minimum standard of
38:04
education set up today's date.
38:07
And that would be a degree that's precedented, you know, by the ACPC.
38:12
The SST would disappear, the STA would disappear, and the STA would disappear,
38:15
and there would be one broader council,
38:19
let's call it the Sport and Medial Therapies Council, just for ease.
38:23
Now, at that stage, there would have to be one set of competences.
38:28
There would be increased bureaucracy, as has been demonstrated with the CNHC,
38:35
which was the voluntary regulator.
38:37
And I was always wary of some of the claims about getting referrals from GPs.
38:42
But, you know, the system of Pates Masters, you know.
38:47
That would fit really well because people who now have been incepted onto the
38:51
Sports and Remedial Therapy Council register who come from a soft tissue background would have
38:58
an identified progression route that not necessarily means that they're going
39:02
after, if they've got the Level 5 diploma, for example,
39:06
they might not have to do the degree and they might be able to based on the
39:10
accreditation prior learning experience they may be able to get onto that master's
39:14
program and there may be more of those master programs
39:17
delivered because of that so there is a marketplace for it but it all depends
39:22
on where we are on that sort of,
39:24
ladder that career ladder as to what we should call ourselves
39:28
and and just for those who are not sda members you know we categorize our members
39:33
based on their level of education
39:35
and we include a scope of practice on the certificate so if you've done a level
39:39
four it will say a level four diploma in sports massage therapy or whatever the education title is
39:45
and as has the scope of practice to work immediately if it's the level three
39:49
it would be the scope of practice limited to pre-post intervention maintenance
39:53
massage if it's a degree it will say they have under,
39:56
undertaken an accredited degree because we get lots of graduate members who
40:00
choose not to be members of some of the other bodies because they prefer our support model.
40:08
Sorry, just one thing. Sorry, Kate. I interrupt you, I'm not going to say something
40:13
far more rumored along the street. But we've said accredited university degrees.
40:19
Who's doing the accrediting and how do we know that they are God's word?
40:25
That's my one worry about using a phrase like a council. I see this very much
40:30
as the remit of a professional statutory regulatory body to accredits.
40:36
Sarah, I don't know whether you feel the same with this. I'm not sure.
40:41
A council for me is an advisory.
40:43
That was just an example of a name that it could be.
40:46
Yeah. It might be the Chartered Society of Sports Therapists,
40:50
but it wouldn't be the FDA, it wouldn't be the SDO, and it wouldn't be the SFT.
40:55
But if we had one big group with meetings, everybody having an equal place and
41:00
kind of all that sort of stuff, and in theory then, obviously there would be
41:03
healthy debates and stuff, but,
41:05
the accreditation would come from a roundtable who's interested in the benefit
41:09
of the industry as opposed to kind of individual. That's the idea.
41:13
There would have to be recognition of those people who train vocational,
41:16
you know, that experience, who come from an exercise rehabilitation instructor
41:20
from the military or from,
41:22
you know, an international institute of sports therapy, from the 90s,
41:25
or, you know, sporttherapieducation.com diploma.
41:33
There would have to be recognition of those. I'm just going to be quick.
41:35
Is that what you were going to say? No, no, no.
41:38
That's why I find it really useful to see it as a qualifications ladder.
41:43
And you might just be really happy with where you are on that rung of the ladder
41:48
and have, you know, why would I want to go further? I'm doing really well where I am.
41:53
But I think we need to ensure that there are progression routes for multiple entry points as well.
42:02
In my mind, I struggled a little bit with the ladder analogy.
42:04
I'll tell you why, and it might not make sense, but I kind of think that in an ideal world,
42:10
the route which someone takes, while they're saying degree or vocational,
42:13
in an ideal world, the route would suit their circumstances and their environment
42:17
and their context and their goals and in picking their path.
42:22
It may be better than a ladder. It's kind of like a roundabout.
42:25
It may well be helping through their choices somebody who is going to be helped
42:31
by that sort of person who's taken that path, who wants a home visit,
42:34
rather than somebody who's gone to another path, which is a university,
42:37
who are probably now going to be.
42:40
Kind of organized conceptually to work for a team, to look at the sport side
42:44
of things, to kind of concentrate on that.
42:46
So I think if there was one organization, I think the whole kind of educational
42:51
system needs to be more based on,
42:53
patient-centered, person-centered sort of thing, you know, isn't because that's
42:58
what I think more than the ladder because who defines what is a higher level of education?
43:04
Can I just interrupt there and say that everybody disappeared and everybody froze then?
43:08
So whatever you were saying, I don't think is being... It really wasn't that
43:13
poor. Kate, what are you going to say?
43:18
I think for me, the levels represent a distinct scope of practice and I think
43:23
vocationally I get a little bit lost with...
43:26
You know, a level three from this training provider versus a level five from
43:30
this training provider. And that's probably just my look of understanding.
43:34
Can you give me an example?
43:35
Because it sounds to me quite structural. It sounds to me, oh,
43:39
you're able to do this manipulation or you're able to do it. I think, I think...
43:46
I think it talks about breadth and depth of competency.
43:50
So soft tissue skills, for example, will probably feature on many rungs of the
43:57
ladder. I'm sticking with the ladder. I'll jump in this day at all. Go for it.
44:03
And, you know, math is ever present in there. But at level three,
44:09
for example, we talk about it being non-pathological, probably.
44:13
At level four, you're talking about pathological.
44:16
And there's an element of assessment there in terms of within the scope of a
44:20
soft tissue therapist and and so on so I think whilst individual skills are
44:27
present and maybe the knowledge that,
44:31
will differ and maybe the autonomy would differ and maybe the responsibility
44:37
in terms of who that client who that treatment is aimed at in terms of client
44:40
population would vary as well does,
44:43
I think it's worth this raising you that a scope of practice is a minimum standard
44:49
for safe and effective just at a single point in time, right? That's good.
44:55
So just because I graduated 10 years ago, whatever it might be,
45:00
with this much scope of practice, I might only work in a very narrow field.
45:06
I've lost fringes of that scope, if that makes sense. And so it's a single point in time.
45:11
And there is a need for continued professional development to maintain confidence.
45:17
Okay, you mentioned before that somebody on that lateral continuum might be
45:21
really happy with their current scope of practice and don't see progression
45:26
routes as something for them.
45:28
You know, very happy, you know, working 10 hours a week in a particular niche environment.
45:33
You know, we still have an obligation to do CFD, you know, within that small niche.
45:39
And that's why the policy should be sort of individualised rather than the blanket policy.
45:46
But, yeah, there are people who are more than happy just to work at a level
45:50
three, a level four, or a level five. They don't want to go any further than that.
45:54
And that's not to undermine it. They're probably doing some incredible work. It's really relieving.
45:59
So I get when we set Mum and Day the Ladder, there's this kind of, I suppose, infatuation.
46:05
A misnomer really that you know you want everybody wants to get to the pinnacle,
46:09
you know that probably isn't true matt can i just answer this nicola's uh comment
46:14
here yes it doesn't mean you are competent okay if you have a certificate of competency,
46:21
and the wording is very important you have been assessed by somebody who's appropriately
46:26
qualified to assess and make the assessment decision that you are competent,
46:31
i agree that a certificate of
46:33
attendance or a certificate of completion doesn't mean you are competent.
46:38
So it all depends on what that certificate wording is.
46:42
That's a follow-up show you're going to do, isn't it, on the difference to certificates
46:45
which are handed out and what that means and how the public needs to be maybe educated on that or not.
46:51
Also, thank you for that, Nicola. I just want to read out your other comments.
46:54
Sorry, I didn't get balanced now.
46:56
Nicola Christian says, I agree, I'm 40. I've been a massage therapist for 16
47:01
plus years, and I do a lot of lived experience with my current ongoing degree.
47:08
I have no desire to be pitched up. My value is a clinical environment,
47:11
one-to-one supporting patients. My strength is making people feel listened to and looked after.
47:16
Yeah, that's great. So thank you for sharing that, Nicola. I think that is very
47:21
much part of the discussion between vocation and university. But anyway, right.
47:26
Last question, guys, because it is 9.02. I'm sure you've got,
47:29
I suspect, maybe potentially you've got lies outside of this topic.
47:33
Here's a big one for you. Okay, so we're going to finish up.
47:34
If someone watching tonight is considering becoming a sports therapist,
47:40
what advice would you give them when choosing an educational pathway?
47:44
They've got to do what's right by them i think it's context dependent there
47:48
is no single one route in into this industry and they need to look at things
47:55
that are important to them that you know might be work-life balance,
48:00
orientations might be financially motivated whatever it might be but i think
48:03
there's no single answer and,
48:05
you you do you you do what works for you,
48:08
no i agree with you i think everyone's different every circumstance is different
48:12
it depends what they want to get out of Again, how much time do they have?
48:17
Are they having another job? You know, a degree is not always sometimes the
48:20
best option. They might start off with this vocational course,
48:23
very similar to what Kate did. Start off with this vocational course,
48:26
find they really enjoy it, and then go on to a degree.
48:29
So it's, yeah, you can't really give a black and white answer.
48:34
But if you do look at a degree, make sure it's accredited. If I make sure it's
48:37
not just, you know. Yeah, that's good.
48:42
What I would say to answer that question is, Matt, is if you are considering
48:46
a career in sports therapy, then ring up some of the associations and speak to them.
48:52
Get a feel for how they're nice to support you. I mean, we don't have an education
48:56
program, so I'm not selling anything.
48:58
It's a support model. But I think that does give us a unique position to be
49:04
able to say, as Kate mentioned, what is your situation? What are you trying to achieve?
49:10
Where do you see yourself working in three to five years time because that would
49:14
then give us you know some information to to be able to guide and support you
49:18
know we never have the answers we can guide and support you so that you can
49:22
make an informed decision,
49:24
yeah that's cool that was one of the conclusions you came to i think the last
49:27
time we were together was like join a professional body and we did the master
49:30
and we and there were so many people who probably are not listening to this
49:33
who need to be listening to this because,
49:35
it's we're telling people already remember us one of the three here and it's
49:38
kind of like yeah we know this,
49:40
yeah okay yeah and you mentioned check accreditation so.
49:44
What accreditation ticks the boxes then Kate what should they be checking for
49:47
is it just presented by anyone I think probably a good place to start is to
49:50
look at the type of job that you want to move into and then have a look at the essential criteria
49:54
for for that job they might stipulate a specific qualification a level of qualification
49:59
a professional body membership
50:01
and I think you work you work back from from there,
50:03
so you can look I mean LinkedIn is amazing now for for jobs,
50:09
good old facebook still has a couple of active groups going but you've got uk sport.gov.uk if you're,
50:15
looking for sport specific roles but have find the job that you really see yourself
50:19
doing five years down the line 10 years down the line and look at the the requirements
50:24
of that role and then go backwards,
50:27
Great advice. Okay. Marvellous. So I think we've reached a decision that it's
50:31
not a case of one or the other.
50:34
It's all about you and the context. Good goals. Fantastic. That's great.
50:37
Well, look, thank you so much for your insight.
50:40
Kate Berlin and Sarah Catlow and Gary as well. Let's leave you behind. That's great.
50:45
Appreciate it. Listeners, I'm sorry if you have been watching and we've been freezing.
50:49
I'm hoping the audio is just absolutely fine and we can upload this to the forecast.
50:54
But I do call the show as those who love people joining us life to apologize
50:57
if it was driving you mad and thank you for the questions and the comments and letting us know,
51:02
if you do if you are listening to the podcast one of the two or three thousand
51:05
who's listened to it then be part of the conversation you can email me matt at this.
51:11
You can email me a question if you want me to pass it on to kate or stara or
51:15
gary if you do want to get in touch with pet or the society's force therapists
51:22
the website is the sst.org,
51:27
And then if you would like to get in touch with Kate, no, sorry,
51:31
with Sarah, and the Sports Therapy
51:33
Organization, the STO, then it's the sportstherapyorganization.net.
51:39
Yeah, and you've got links and all that there, and social media there.
51:41
And obviously the STA, like I say, I'm at the STA.co.uk, you know the website, which is the STA.co.uk.
51:49
But yeah, keep the conversation going. Or as I always say, put a question on YouTube.
51:54
Okay, the reason we go out to YouTube is it's got a really good shelf,
51:56
link to google so it keeps the conversation going don't use facebook for the
52:00
sake it just disappears in a post never to be seen again or it's sold for money
52:03
somewhere else you know so use youtube and we,
52:07
get messages for that we can continue if you've got any question be one of those
52:11
but don't let this disappear because it's for you your questions are worth more
52:15
than anything we can say so let's know,
52:17
right then next week nothing there you go we're having a break end of july break,
52:22
all going away together everyone on the screen here to Marbella.
52:26
A little B&B sorted out. A little five feet to have a drink in a colitis. It'll be wonderful.
52:31
And we're not performing as much to talk about sports therapy.
52:33
That's going to be great. We'll send you a postcard. But we will be back in August.
52:36
That's on Tuesday nights at 8 o'clock on the STA YouTube channel or Facebook page.
52:41
So yeah, do those then. So thank you anyway. Thanks once again.
52:44
Kate Williams, thank you very much.
52:46
Thank you, Sir Catley. Thank you Gary. And thank you for being back.
52:49
Can I just add that? Fantastic. Right. Thanks everyone. Until August,
52:53
take care of yourselves and obviously as a.