Steinhardt School of Education. Department of Occupational Therapy.

In 1940 NYU's School of Education established a Department of Occupational Therapy (OT), making NYU one of a handful of universities to educate occupational therapists. From 1941 to 1942 Susan Colson Wilson, Director of OT at Brooklyn State Hospital, taught the first OT courses.

In 1942 Frieda J. Behlen became the first full-time instructor of the Department of Occupational Therapy. During those first years of the program's existence Behlen was in charge of program development as well as teaching all of the applied OT theory courses. In 1943 the program earned formal approval from the Council on Medical Education of the American Medical Association. NYU's was the only OT school at the time to offer courses for both day and evening students and to accept male students and African-American students.

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