Building the Future of Care: How a Toy Hack and a $74 Million Campus Are Shaping Florida's Healthcare Landscape

ST. AUGUSTINE, Fla. — October 29, 2026 — For most children, the holiday season is a time of brightly colored boxes and the simple joy of a new toy. But for the families of children with limited fine motor control, the standard toy aisle is often a landscape of inaccessible buttons, tiny switches, and frustration. Play is a fundamental developmental right, yet the systems that design our world frequently leave the most vulnerable behind.

This intersection of accessibility, community intervention, and systemic healthcare training will take center stage on November 7 and 8, when the University of St. Augustine for Health Sciences (USAHS) hosts the Florida Occupational Therapy Association’s annual conference, FOTA26. The two-day event, themed "Shine the Light, Be the Light – Leading Change Through Occupational Therapy," represents much more than a routine professional gathering. It serves as a real-time laboratory for how academic institutions can bridge the gap between high-tech medical education and grassroots community needs.

Engineering Inclusion Through Play

Perhaps the most compelling initiative on the FOTA26 agenda is "Hacking for the Holidays." The workshop is a masterclass in multidisciplinary problem-solving, pairing USAHS occupational therapy students with local occupational therapy assistant students and a high school robotics team. Together, they will deconstruct everyday, off-the-shelf toys and rewire them into switch-adapted devices.

The clinical necessity for this work is stark. Approximately 1 in 6 U.S. children between the ages of 3 and 17 have one or more developmental disabilities. While commercially available adapted toys exist, they are often prohibitively expensive, sometimes costing four to five times as much as their standard counterparts. This financial barrier effectively prices many families out of accessible play.

"When you bring together the clinical insight of an occupational therapy student and the technical ingenuity of a high school robotics builder, you bypass the commercial bottlenecks that keep assistive technology out of reach for working-class families," noted one local disability advocate familiar with the program.

By installing larger, easier-to-press buttons, the initiative allows children with motor impairments to activate the toys independently. The finished products will be handed directly to children during the conference, building upon a previous USAHS effort that successfully delivered 34 switch-adapted toys. It is a localized, immediate solution to a systemic failure in inclusive design, demonstrating how community partnerships can effectively subsidize the high cost of assistive technology.

This localized intervention is particularly critical in Florida. Despite its economic growth, the state continues to struggle with pediatric healthcare outcomes. Recent data places Florida 41st nationally in a comparison of states for children's healthcare, based on indicators of cost, quality, and access. Furthermore, nearly half of American children with a developmental delay are not identified by the time they enter kindergarten. Interventions like the toy hack not only provide immediate joy but also serve as vital touchpoints for families navigating a complex and often underfunded pediatric care system.

Anchoring a Statewide Evolution in Care

The FOTA26 conference also highlights the outsized influence USAHS currently holds over the trajectory of occupational therapy in Florida. It is a rare alignment of academic and professional power: USAHS faculty members Antonette Fernandez and Nichele Brunder currently serve as President and Vice President of FOTA, respectively. By hosting the state conference while simultaneously leading its governing association, the university has positioned itself as the undisputed epicenter of Florida's occupational therapy evolution.

“FOTA has spent years advancing occupational therapy in Florida, and hosting FOTA26 is one way the University continues to help carry that work forward,” Vivian Sanchez, Chancellor and Chief Executive Officer of USAHS, said in a statement. “We are especially proud that our own faculty, FOTA President Antonette Fernandez and Vice President Nichele Brunder, are leading the association during this important time. Their leadership reflects a deep commitment to advancing the profession, advocating for excellence, and furthering FOTA’s mission across the state and beyond.”

This leadership comes at a critical juncture. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics projects an 11 percent employment growth for the occupational therapy field nationally from 2023 to 2033, translating to approximately 9,800 open jobs annually. Florida, driven by a rapidly aging population and expanding healthcare networks, is projected to be one of the top five states for occupational therapy job growth over the next decade.

“Occupational therapy continues to evolve alongside new research, technologies, and patient needs, and staying current is essential for every practitioner and student in our field,” Helen Carey, Senior Program Director of Occupational Therapy Programs for USAHS’s Florida campuses, noted. “Welcoming Florida’s occupational therapy community to our campus gives our students and faculty a meaningful opportunity to contribute to that conversation and learn from colleagues shaping practice across the state.”

A $74 Million Bet on the Healthcare Workforce

The backdrop for this convergence of policy, education, and community service is USAHS’s newly minted St. Augustine campus. Opened in February 2025 at the former site of the St. Augustine Record newspaper, the 122,000-square-foot facility represents a massive $74 million investment in regional healthcare infrastructure.

The campus is a testament to the changing business of medical education. It features a Center for Innovative Clinical Practice equipped with a 14-bed hospital ward simulation, complex hospital rooms, an Activities of Daily Living Lab simulating a home environment, Anatomage tables, driving simulators, and virtual reality equipment. This is not the chalkboard-and-lecture-hall education of the past; it is highly capitalized, immersive workforce training designed to produce practitioners who can seamlessly transition into high-acuity medical environments.

The investment also reflects broader corporate strategies within the healthcare education sector. In December 2024, USAHS was acquired by Perdoceo Education Corporation for approximately $138 million. While the university's daily operations and community initiatives like the toy hack remain deeply localized, they are now backed by significant corporate resources aimed at scaling healthcare education to meet booming market demands. In a state where occupational therapists command an average annual wage of nearly $100,000, the pipeline of highly trained graduates is a lucrative and essential commodity.

Yet, for all the millions invested in simulation labs and corporate acquisitions, the true measure of a healthcare system's efficacy ultimately rests on its human impact. The FOTA26 conference embodies this duality. In one room, industry leaders will debate state licensure, workforce data, and the integration of virtual reality in clinical practice. In another, a coalition of graduate students and high school teenagers will sit with soldering irons and wire cutters, quietly dismantling the barriers that keep a child from playing with a toy.