Health, Exercise, and Sports Sciences ETDs

Publication Date

5-9-1988

Abstract

This study focused on the clinical clock hour requirement mandated by the National Athletic Trainers Association. Research in the development of clinical clock hours was vague and inconsistent with what students were actually accumulating in athletic training field experience.

The primary purpose of this study was to analyze the mandatory requirement of clinical clock hours for athletic training students to determine the relationship between the present NATA requirements and passing the NATA Certification Examination.

The secondary purpose was to record athletic training students' clinical clock hours and analyze differences of these hours by districts, years, athletic training programs, and passing attempts and further analyze relationships between passing attempts, districts, years, and athletic training programs.

The research instrument selected for collecting data relative to differences in clinical clock hours of athletic training students within the NATA was developed in questionnaire format. The instrument indicated the differences in clinical clock hours of athletic training students in years, districts, programs, passing attempts, and pass/fail ratio.

The subjects consisted of 998 male and female certified athletic trainers who attended the 1986 National Athletic Trainers Convention. Athletic trainers who were certified by passing the NATA Certification Examination in the years 1971-1986 were required to complete the entire questionnaire. Any of the athletic trainers who were in the "Grandfather Clause" category and participated in the study answered only questions one and ten.

A one-way analysis of variance with a Duncan/Tukey was used to determine differences between the number of clinical clock hours accumulated and each NATA requirement, program, year, district and attempts required to pass the certification examination. Contingency analysis was used to show relationships between the independent variables program, year, district and pass attempts. It was not used to determine the existence or strength of a relationship, but describe existing facts of the population of athletic training students within the NATA.

The findings of this study indicated that athletic training students accumulated significantly more clinical clock hours in each program than the NATA requirement of 800 hours in the curriculum and 1800 hours in internship program. The internship student also accumulated vii significantly more clinical clock hours as compared to the curriculum student. It should be noted that a high number of clinical clock hours were rela ed to a high single attempt passing rate.

Further findings indicated that a high accumulation of clinical clock hours in each year, district and program were also related to a high single attempt passing rate. The findings of this study provided information on clinical clock hours and their effect on passing the NATA Certification Examination, indicating that programs and districts that accumulated a high number of clinical clock hours were more likely to pass the certification examination on a single attempt.

Document Type

Dissertation

Language

English

Degree Name

Physical Education

Level of Degree

Doctoral

Department Name

Health, Exercise, and Sports Sciences

First Committee Member (Chair)

William L. DeGroot

Second Committee Member

Unknown

Third Committee Member

Charlotte L. Piper

Fourth Committee Member

E. A. Scholer

Fifth Committee Member

L. F. Diehm

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