Dr. Schwind is very happy to be returning to Cedar Lane and is thrilled to be part of the Cedar Lane family.  She has an undergraduate degree in Occupational Therapy from East Carolina University and completed internships at Duke University and John Hopkins University.  She has a graduate degree which she designed combining Healthcare Administration with Educational Administration from Old Dominion University.  Dr. Schwind has her Doctorate of Health Science in Rehabilitation Sciences from Drexel University.  She is Board Certified in Pediatrics from AOTA and has a Specialty Certification in School-Based Practice from AOTA.  In addition, she has been inducted into the Roster of Fellows at the American Occupational Therapy Association.

She began her career at Fairfax Hospital in 1990 working primarily in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit and the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and then moved to Tidewater where she worked at the Children's Hospital of the King's Daughters doing inpatient, outpatient and home health care.  She transitioned to Riverside Regional Medical Center where she worked in the early intervention arena and she taught at Tidewater Community College (TCC) as a professor in the Occupational Therapy Assistant program.  While at TCC, she also served as the Academic Fieldwork Coordinator setting up all of the student internships. 

Her school system experience includes Chesapeake Schools and Loudoun County Public Schools where she has worked with a variety of students.  She has also taught at Northern Virginia Community College in the Occupational Therapy Assistant Program, teaching the Assistive Technology course.  It is the school setting that she has developed a true passion for.  This school year she will be supporting students at Cedar Lane, Trailside Middle School and at Moorefield Station.  

While getting her doctorate, she completed an internship at the American Occupational Therapy Association (AOTA) where she was able to present information about the role of occupational therapy in transition at the National Education Association.  Her dissertation was research focusing on transition skills with an emphasis on the importance of developing job skills and work behaviors in the elementary school years.   https://vimeo.com/161837834 

She has co-authored articles with Judith Schoonover about adapting art tools to ensure all children can participate in the art room regardless of their abilities. She has received three grants from the Loudoun Education Foundation, one related to this art tool adaptation project. She was featured on a live webinar with Lesson Pix featuring the art tool adaptations.  She has published an article about using routines in the school community to develop work behaviors and job skills in OT Practice and with Closing the Gap.  She co-authored two chapters in  occupational therapy reference books about school-based practice and life skills.  She was interviewed for another book regarding collaboration and developing transition skills in elementary school.  She has also been interviewed for several podcasts related to occupational therapy and school-based practice.  VCU and CTI featured her in a webinar about the role of related service providers in developing transition skills.   

She has presented at the Virginia Occupational Therapy Association Annual Conference, the Virginia Occupational Therapy School Symposium Conference and nationally at the AOTA National Conference, the America Speech Language Hearing Association (ASHA), the Assistive Technology Conference of New England (ATCNE), ECHO TIES as well as the Assistive Technology Industry Association (ATIA) to name a few.     In 2021, Dr. Schwind received the Innovator of the Year Award from the National Board for Certification in Occupational Therapy for the transition program she developed at Cedar Lane.