Multidisciplinary Student Groups Support Digital Education as a Public Health Precautional Action to Prevent Spread of COVID-19 Infection: A Mixed Methods Study

Skotheim²,

2022

Higher education institutions must prepare students from health, social, and teacher education programs for interprofessional collaboration (IPC) among children and young people with challenging childhood experiences. We wanted to explore if digital small group rooms, breakout rooms, are feasible for students to learn about, from, and with each other in an interprofessional learning (IPL) initiative, in order to practice IPC. This study is a repeated cross-sectional study from the academic years 2020/21 and 2021/22 with 5412 respondents. The students worked in student-led IPL groups with a case-based learning approach and limited interaction with supervisors. The youngest students agreed to a larger extent that they learned more about, from, and with other students. The teacher students were more positive towards discussing sensitive issues in breakout rooms than the health students. The health students agreed to a larger extent than the teacher students that breakout rooms were suited for pre-service IPC training. The results from this study indicate that breakout rooms provide a potential arena to practice generic skills. If properly organized and structured, breakout rooms can be an excellent learning resource. Breakout rooms provide a safe online environment for learning and practicing IPC, and for training on talking about sensitive issues.

Breakout Rooms Serve as a Suitable Tool for Interprofessional Pre-Service Online Training among Students within Health, Social, and Education Study Programs

Skotheim²,

2022

Supervisors’ Perspectives on Online Interprofessional Supervision: Results from a Mixed-Methods Longitudinal Cross-Sectional Study

Skotheim²,

2022

Collaboration in interprofessional collaboration (IPC) teams is a part of working in welfare services. Unlike uniprofessional supervision, interprofessional supervision involves supervisors and students with different educational backgrounds. This study explores 105 supervisors’ responses after synchronous supervision of 15,700 students from teaching, health, and social work education programs who participated in an annual preservice interprofessional learning (IPL) course from 2018 to 2022. The purpose was to explore supervisors’ experience of the online IPL supervisor role and of the student’s learning outcomes through a longitudinal mixed-methods repeated design. Response rates: 61%, 45%, 82% and 40%, respectively. The students worked in IPL groups with limited interaction with supervisors, using a case-based learning approach. The supervisors were supportive of IPL but suggested changes to increase relevance. The imbalance in the knowledge base on child-related topics and IPL preparedness among the student groups was challenging. Some questioned the need for supervision, whereas others were concerned about the limited time allocated for supervision. We conclude that online supervision is forward-looking because candidates must prepare for helping users, such as children and their next-of-kin, online. We deduce that online supervision is relevant for the future and less complicated than IPL supervision

Transformation from Blended to Online Learning: A Four-Year Longitudinal Cross-Sectional Interprofessional Study

Skotheim²,

2023

Professional students need to train in online interprofessional collaboration (IPC). During a longitudinal evaluation for 2018–2022 of an interprofessional learning (IPL) curriculum, nearly 7000 students from health, social care, and teacher education programs completed indicator questions concerning learning about child-related topics and skills required for IPC during their first, second, and third curriculum years of study. The students worked in student-led IPL groups according to a case-based learning approach. Online IPL yielded lower mean scores than in-person IPL. The decreased learning outcomes from year 2 to year 3 for the IPL initiative are not due to the online delivery mode. The lack of reported progress in the IPL courses is more likely due to students not experiencing a gain in IPL learning outcomes. Significant differences were found between teacher education and child welfare students and health and social care students, reflecting IPC challenges in working life. We conclude that online IPL is forward-looking because candidates must be prepared for online IPC and for helping users, such as children, online. Although our data support that IPL is complex, the learning experience has tremendous transfer value to welfare services because we assume that the same issues will appear in IPC.