Rhoda Erhardt
Mother, Grandmother, Great Grandmother
Pioneer, Teacher, Mentor, Visionary
1) A pioneer as a female officer commissioned as a Lieutenant in the US Army in the 1950’s who served veterans assisting them with developing strategies on how to move, live and function as normal as possible given their burns and injuries.
2) A mother who raised four children on her own between ages 2 through 9 and then off to college and successful careers. She returned to the work force to pay the bills and turned that skill set and need into an avocation and knowledge base that touched so many children and families with disabilities and impacted their lives positively.
3) A teacher, mentor and visionary whom became a giant in the Occupational Therapy field and impacted thousands of therapists, doctors, universities, hospitals and clinics with her understanding of developing a knowledge base of normal hand and eye function to then be able to provide proper therapy and techniques to help patients and therapists as well as families understand how to best treat their disability.
4) A multimedia content creator ahead of her time as she harnessed and understood the power of combining video, print and books (and her brand) to provide the teaching and subject matter, as well distribution techniques, to market her products and content globally.
5) She was an amazing woman and mother whom everyone she encountered felt special and touched by her compassion and brilliance.
Rhoda and her family established the Rhoda Erhardt Occupational Therapy Endowed Scholarship Fund at the University of Illinois's Chicago Department of OT to help students in the Masters and Doctoral Program at UIC OT afford ongoing assistance in tuition to achieve their goals to help others thru OT.