Applications of an Online Course Management System to Provide Consistent Clinical Educational Experiences for Clinical Laboratory Science Students Assigned to a Diverse Set of Affiliate Sites

Clinical Laboratory Science, Spring 2004 by Larson, Carol, Honeycutt, Karen

Clinical Laboratory Educators Conference 2004 Abstracts

As part of the three-year Reaching Across Borders Grant (RAB), the University of Nebraska Medical Center's (UNMC) Clinical Laboratory Science (CLS) Program will increase by five its number of clinical affiliates for a total of nine in Wyoming, South Dakota, and Nebraska. Of the 46 weeks of CLS education, students complete 35 weeks at their assigned clinical site. Challenges arise in providing a similar clinical educational experience for the student in the large hospital reference laboratory, the full-service rural hospital laboratory, and the private laboratory. In addition, due to the shortage of laboratory professionals, a decreasing and or unstable resource is the bench instructor's time in providing quality, one-on-one instruction. With staffing at a minimum, it is a challenge to provide similar educational experiences from week to week within one site, let alone across several sites. The UNMC CLS program utilizes the online course management system, Blackboard(TM), to streamline clinical education across sites and provide support to efficiently utilize the bench instructor's teaching time. Independent learning is supported with online instructional units complete with objectives; audioenhanced PowerPoint(TM) mini-lectures; archived videostreamed classroom sessions; higher-level process-focused activities; and reviews and self-assessments providing an all-inclusive study guide to be coordinated with clinical experience. The asynchronous environment allows for flexibility for the laboratory, clinical instructor and the learner for improved time management. Evaluation of the online learning environment by student and instructor provides specific issues of focus for continued curriculum development and improvement, including asynchronous flexibility and format standardization of learning materials.

Carol Larson MSEd CLS(NCA), Karen Honeycutt MEd, University of Nebraska Medical Center, Omaha NE