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The community comes to campus: the Patient and Community Fair
Author(s) -
Towle Angela,
Godolphin William,
Kline Cathy
Publication year - 2015
Publication title -
the clinical teacher
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.354
H-Index - 26
eISSN - 1743-498X
pISSN - 1743-4971
DOI - 10.1111/tct.12285
Subject(s) - attendance , public relations , curriculum , visitor pattern , community organization , service learning , community engagement , health care , community health , medical education , context (archaeology) , psychology , medicine , nursing , pedagogy , political science , public health , computer science , paleontology , law , biology , programming language
Summary Background Community‐based learning connects students with local communities so that they learn about the broad context in which health and social care is provided; however, students usually interact with only one or a few organisations that serve a particular population. One example of a community‐based learning activity is the health fair in which students provide health promotion and screening for local communities. Context We adapted the health fair concept to develop a multi‐professional educational event at which, instead of providing service, students learn from and about the expertise and resources of not‐for‐profit organisations. Innovation The fair is an annual 1‐day event that students can attend between, or in place of, classes. Each community organisation has a booth to display information. One‐hour ‘patient panels’ are held on a variety of topics throughout the day. Evaluation methods include questionnaires, exit interviews and visitor tracking sheets. Over 5 years (2009–2013), the fair increased in size with respect to estimated attendance, number of participating organisations, number of patient panels and number of students for whom the fair is a required curriculum component. Students learn about a range of patient experiences and community resources, and information about specific diseases or conditions. Implications The fair is an efficient way for students to learn about a range of community organisations. It fosters university–community engagement through continuing connections between students, faculty members and community organisations. Lessons learned include the need for community organisations to have techniques to engage students, and ways to overcome challenges of evaluating an informal ‘drop‐in’ event. The fair is an efficient way for students to learn about a range of community organisations