Changes In Undergraduate Education Research Articles

Meeting report: the first National Academies Summer Institute for Undergraduate Education in Biology.

Meeting report: the first National Academies Summer Institute for Undergraduate Education in Biology.

Fueling educational reform: Bio2010--biology for the future.

Fueling educational reform: Bio2010--biology for the future.

A Decade of Changes in Undergraduate Education: A National Study of System "Transformation"

Evidence from two longitudinal student databases collected nearly a decade apart suggests that undergraduate education in the United States has been "transformed" in many ways that are consistent with national reform efforts that emerged during the 1980s. Institutions have strengthened their capacity to foster faculty-student interaction, student-student interaction, and student engagement in community service. Institutions show diminished capacity, however, to foster academic engagement and social activism among students.

Country report: Australia

The last 10 years has been an interesting time for Australian medical education despite reduced funding. There are five main workforce trends: a rural/urban maldistribution, a need for more specialists, public hospital staffing difficulties, increasing female practitioners and under-representation of indigenous practitioners. Lack of resources is a problem facing Deans, with pressure for clinical service in teaching hospitals. Entrepreneurial activities have been undertaken including the enrollment of overseas students. Medical schools have also responded to important government initiatives. Australia's 11 medical schools have undergone significant reform in the last decade. There is a mix of four (graduate), five and six year courses. AUSTRALIA'S NEW MEDICAL SCHOOL: James Cook University opened the first medical school in northern Australia in 2000. The School admits students from rural, northern Australian and indigenous backgrounds. It has a strong regional mission. RURAL AND COMMUNITY-BASED EDUCATION: Government funding to address the maldistribution of the workforce has led to the establishment of rural clubs, Departments of Rural Health and community-based programs. There have been recent moves to improve education in the two years following graduation. This includes the initiation of national projects in curriculum and assessment. Postgraduate programs in Australia are being reformed to build on the changes in undergraduate education. CME is also under review. Australian medical educators should build on the recent reforms and take on some of the new directions in medical education.

Need for Systemic Change in Undergraduate Education

Changes in the environment, in technology, and in societal needs will result in a change in the expectations from our graduates. Meeting these expectations will require a systemic change in undergraduate education in horticulture. While we do an excellent job in training students, we are not as effective in educating them. Our students must develop critical thinking skills and become adept at solving problems utilizing a multidisciplinary integrated approach rather than in a reductive manner. Achieving these skills is essential if our graduates are to be successful in the rapidly changing job market. Implementing curricular change requires faculty ownership as well as administrative support and an appropriate rewards and recognition system. These and other principles from the USDA-funded project on Theoretical Bases for Systemic Change in Higher Education in Agriculture will be discussed.

Issues in the effective use of computers in introductory and advanced courses in psychology

The recent proliferation of time-shared terminals, computers, and instructional software is producing a dramatic change in undergraduate education in psychology. Although computers have been used for many years in research in psychology, their use as instructional alternatives only recently has been thrust upon the academic community, a development for which many faculty-even experienced computer users-are ill prepared. The use of computers and microcom­ puters in instruction can provide the instructor, and more importantly, the student, with an ef­ fective pedagogical tool. However, computers cannot be introduced into the curriculum in a piecemeal or haphazard fashion. In this paper, issues involved in the effective introduction and use of computers in teaching are outlined. There are now so many computer packages available for use in instruction in psychology that a faculty mem­ ber is faced with many choices. In reading the promo­ tional literature provided by publishers and enthusiastic authors, one has the impression that it is easy to introduce computer-based instructional materials into one's classes. Most of the documentation provided with software does little to alter that perception. However, the experience of hundreds of instructors in psychology (as well as many more in other disciplines) amply demonstrates that the path to effective integration of computers into course work is strewn with traps and pitfalls for the unwary. These problems have led to frustrating experiences for faculty and students alike and, surprisingly, often have led to the elimination of instructional computing in subsequent offer­ ings of the course. The purpose of this paper is to discuss ways of introduc­ ing instructional computing into courses which will en­ hance both teaching and learning. The curricular empha­ sis is on introductory and advanced substantive courses. The methods to be covered include: (1) surveying avail­ able software; (2) evaluating software for its suitability to a particular course; (3) determining the resources (hard­ ware, software, space, staff, etc.) needed to utilize in­ structional microcomputing; (4) modifying the course syl­ labus to reflect the new resources to be used; (5) monitoring microcomputer use during the course; (6) evaluating the effectiveness of the microcomputer in improving or enhancing the course; and (7) integrating software into the departmental curriculum. Although each of these tasks is important, and I have tried to order them in a logical sequence, circumstances at individual institutions may dictate different orders and

Emotional Illness and the Family Physician: II. Management and Treatment

In order to better design continuing education courses in Psychiatry to fit the needs of practlcmg family physicians, a questionnaire was sent to all the members of what was at that time the Michigan Chap­ ter of the American Academy of General Practice. Information obtained from the survey included type and frequency of emotional disease encountered in practice and methods used to treat it, attitudes to­ ward emotionally ill patients, availability and utiliza­ tion of psychiatric resources, and willingness to engage in and content desired in postgraduate psychiatric education. During the analysis of this survey, it be­ came apparent that the investigation offered a unique opportunity to assess the impact on Psychiatry of such recent developments as new forms of therapy, the in­ troduction of psychoactive drugs and pragmatic treat­ ment techniques developed during World War II. Specifically, it was felt that these advances would underscore the scientific basis of the discipline and alter the perception of it in the medical profession. Further, it was believed that the enhanced credibility of Psychiatry with respect to other specialties would be paralleled by changes in undergraduate education. Subsequently, the net effect of these changes would be manifest in the behavior of practicing physicians who could be expected to be more aware of the emotional needs and diseases of their patients and be more will­ ing to treat these conditions. In order to test these assumptions, the responses of the participating physicians were grouped on the basis of year of graduation from medical school, pre and post 1950. This year was selected as the dividing point because it was felt that the undergraduate educa­ tion of physicians graduating during or after this year would have been affected by the changes taking place in Psychiatry. In the first article of the series, Fisher et all, the physicians were compared on the types, fre­ quencies and severity of emotional illness seen and their diagnostic methods. As expected it was found that physicians who graduated after 1950 recognized emotional illness significantly more often than did