Computers in the Faculty of Health Science—5 years on
Introduction
Central Queensland University (CQU) provides undergraduate and postgraduate education to over 10 000 students studying on campus and through its five regional Queensland campuses and six international centres. Lectures for campus-based students may be delivered via video conferencing or audiographic facilities; teleconferencing and electronic mail discussion groups provide regular contact for many students; and individual lecturers are experimenting with flexible learning technologies including web-based resource materials, Internet CHAT and the electronic submission of assignments.
In 1989, the fledgling Faculty of Health Science, CQU, committed itself to a major instructional development project for its nursing education program. While the project, funded both by a National Priority (Reserve) Fund (NPRF) grant and the University, led to the development of some computer-based learning materials, it was more instrumental in the Faculty's widespread adoption of information technology (IT).
The funded project, completed in 1992, was examined by one of the authors from the perspective of the project participants [1]. He identified some of the deficiencies of the project and its management, how they were resolved, and their consequences. As the CAL/CML (computer assisted/managed learning) Academic Coordinator (1993, personal communication, 23 February) indicated:
‘In hindsight, we've done at least two-thirds of what we started out to do—and the base is there—staff are committed to CAL. Some of them will never do any CAL development themselves, but they are all committed…The real benefit is to the students. They are getting the benefit of the materials developed and in the pipeline’.
The other author was employed for several years in the Faculty support role, providing hands-on formal computer training for staff and students as well as informal hands-on support to individuals, developing and testing new computer-based learning materials, and developing both multimedia and web-based materials. This paper reviews the original project and reports on subsequent developments.
Section snippets
CAL/CML in the Faculty of Health Science 1989–1992
The establishment of the Faculty of Health Science and the Diploma/Bachelor of Nursing program resulted from the 1990 shift of pre-registration nursing education in Queensland from hospitals to the university sector and the demand for post-RN degree completion programs. The foundation Dean of the Faculty was an ‘early adopter’ [2]of the use of computers, specifically microcomputers, in both education and university administration, and had a vision of how they could be used to enhance learning.
Computer-based learning in the Faculty of Health science 1993–1997
At present, the Faculty of Health Science has 1100 plus students undertaking professional studies and research degrees in Health Science, Primary Health Care, Health Promotion and Health Education, Health Informatics and Management, Human Movement Science, Nursing, Occupational Health and Safety, Midwifery, and Indigenous Therapies. Every undergraduate student has an electronic mail address, uses computers for word processing and other productivity tasks, and receives at least a basic
Change and the legacy
The challenges of using the technology have not changed; staff and students alike insist that the computers are too slow and are always busy, ‘[I] couldn't get on a computer because everyone was doing assignments on them, doing e-mail and CHAT lines.’ (Student, personal comment, 1997) However, they continue to be enthusiastic about the computer-based learning materials: ‘It [CAL] was one of those different teaching methods, not rote learning. It's more learning in a different context so that it
Acknowledgements
The 1997 student comments in this paper are from a current research project (S.M. Stewart, A.A. Plummer) through CQU's Research Centre for Open and Distance Learning, ‘Computer Assisted Learning (CAL) in Health Science: Are CAL developers using educational technologies appropriately to meet the learner's needs?’
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