Use of multiplatform CD-ROMs for disseminating supplementary learning materials in a pharmaceutical calculations course

American Journal of Pharmaceutical Education, Fall 1999 by Ramanathan, Murali

Samples of the CD-ROM Contents. Figure 1 is typical of the screen the students see when the CD-ROM is opened. Figure 2 shows the appearance of the browser page generated when users follow instructions and double click the index file in Figure 1. The links in Figure 2 lead to the various exams. Upon clicking, say the Exams 1996 link, the index page shown in Figure 3 is generated. This page contains links to all the 1996 Exams as well to the index pages for 1995 Exams and 1997 Exams. E-mail links to the course coordinator were also provided on each index page. The index files for the 1995 and 1997 Exams are correspondingly similar in appearance. The top and bottom of a typical Exam are shown in Figure 4 and Figure 5, respectively As shown in Figure 5, there are links to all other exams of that year as well links to the index pages for the other pages. These links allows the student to navigate between exams without having to repeatedly visit an index page.

Student Response to the CD-ROM. Table II shows data obtained from a class evaluation survey administered one month after the introduction of CD-ROM. Responses to ten questions relating to CD-ROM usage were sought in this survey.

The survey indicated that 71 percent of the respondents had CD-ROM equipped computers and about the same percentage had Internet access from home. The material provided on the CD-ROM was used by 65 percent of the respondents at least once a week suggesting that students actively refer to the CD-ROM to obtain supplemental course materials. About 59 percent of the class responded with a score of 3 or more on the question relating to the effect of CD-ROM availability on Web page use suggesting that the CD-ROM did reduce the dependence on course Web pages for supplemental course materials. Finally, 71 percent of the respondents had a score of 3 or more on the effect of the CD-ROM and its contents on learning.

It has been difficult to assess the impact of CD-ROM distribution on printing costs because the printers at School of Pharmacy do not generate reports that can be used to track printing requests. However, the printer cartridge consumption in the School of Pharmacy Computer Facility is down from six cartridges in Fall 1997 to five cartridges in Fall 1998. Since each printer cartridge represents approximately 9,000 to 12,000 printed pages, the benefits of saving even one cartridge every semester, if sustained or improved upon, could be substantial, However, there are a large number of public sites on campus that students could potentially use for printing and any estimate that is obtained based on data from a limited number of sites could potentially be biased or error prone.

DISCUSSION

In this report, some of the considerations that motivated the adoption of CD-ROMs in a pharmaceutical calculations course were discussed. The content-related and delivery issues that went into the planning process for PHC 311 as well the implementation methodology employed were described so that other instructors could consider using CD-ROMs in courses. Clearly, CD-ROMs can be designed and implemented for large class teaching with very modest investments in equipment. The survey results suggests that students in the pharmacy education setting refer to the CD-ROM material frequently.