Abstract
BackgroundDue to the COVID-19 pandemic, clinical rotations at the University of Michigan Medical School (UMMS) were suspended on March 17, 2020, per the Association of American Medical Colleges’ recommendations. No alternative curriculum existed to fill the educational void for clinical students. The traditional approach to curriculum development was not feasible during the pandemic as faculty were redeployed to clinical care, and the immediate need for continued learning necessitated a new model.ApproachOne student developed an outline for an online course on pandemics based on peer-to-peer conversations regarding learners’ interests and needs, and she proposed that students author the content given the immediate need for a curriculum. Fifteen student volunteers developed content to fill knowledge gaps, and expert faculty reviewers confirmed that the student authors had successfully curated a comprehensive curriculum.EvaluationThe crowdsourced student content coalesced into a 40-hour curriculum required for all 371 clinical-level students at UMMS. This student-driven effort took just 17 days from outline to implementation, and the final product is a full course comprising five modules, multiple choice questions, discussion boards, and assignments. Learners were surveyed to gauge success, and 93% rated this content as relevant to all medical students.ReflectionThe successful implementation of this model for curriculum development, grounded in the Master Adaptive Learner framework, suggests that medical students can be entrusted as stewards of their own education. As we return to a post-pandemic “normal,” this approach could be applied to the maintenance and de novo development of future curricula.Supplementary InformationThe online version of this article (10.1007/s40037-021-00650-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.
Highlights
Background Due to the COVID19 pandemic, clinical rotations at the University of Michigan Medical School (UMMS) were suspended on March 17, 2020, per the Association of American Medical Colleges’ recommendations
Given that clinical rotations are in-person, bedside experiences, no model or infrastructure existed for their remote completion when they were suspended per the Association of American Medical Colleges’ (AAMC) recommendation on March 17, 2020 [1]
Because learning and many other engagements were paused at the outset of the pandemic, student authors were able to devote themselves rather singularly to this project. The success of this project was contingent on the UMMS administration’s acceptance of the unconventional approach. With these limitations in mind, we feel that the most important contribution this piece makes to the literature is one of process: students can contribute to the development of their own curricula during extenuating circumstances, and a Kirkpatrick’s first-level evaluation of the resulting curriculum suggests that target learners view it favorably
Summary
The 2019 novel coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic disrupted traditional educational practices and created a decidedly abnormal learning environment for clinical medical students. The student-drafted materials were edited by the leadership team of three students (JBK, CAK, NHM) and one faculty member (EDL) for cohesiveness and reviewed by 25 content experts These experts included emergency medicine, critical care, and general medicine faculty; epidemiologists; physicians with palliative care training; medical educators with expertise on teaching concepts about evidence-based medicine; clinical ethicists; and health sciences librarians. The development of this course serves as a case study in how our student authors innately engaged in the MAL framework, even without prior intention of doing so They engaged in the planning phase as they reflected on pre-existing knowledge about their respective modules and pandemics in general, identified their knowledge gaps, and reasoned that what they had learned far was insufficient in the new paradigm created by COVID-19. Almost all learners (93%) felt that this content is relevant to all medical students, and 90% felt that the relevance extends across all specialties
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