Delivering a MOOC for literature searching in health libraries: evaluation of a pilot project

Abstract

In an era when library budgets are being reduced, Massive Online Open Courses (MOOC's) can offer practical and viable alternatives to the delivery of costly face-to-face training courses. In this study, guest writers Gil Young from Health Care Libraries Unit - North, Lisa McLaren from Brighton and Sussex Medical School and Liverpool University PhD student Michelle Maden describe the outcomes of a funded project they led to develop a MOOC to deliver literature search training for health librarians. Funded by Health Education England, the MOOC was developed by the Library and Information Health Network North West as a pilot project that ran for six weeks. In particular, the MOOC target audience is discussed, how content was developed for the MOOC, promotion and participation, cost-effectiveness, evaluation, the impact of the MOOC and recommendations for future development. H. S.

Exploring the Cost of eLearning in Health Professions Education: Scoping Review

“…Twenty-two studies [13,16,19,22,23,26,[30][31][32][33][34]39,40,[43][44][45]48,50,[52][53][54][55] provided analysis of implementation costs in eLearning without comparison to other learning platforms.…”

“…McDuffie et al [33] No explicit cost methodology/technique described 6 2630 400 Asynchronous Moreno-Ger et al [34] No explicit cost methodology/technique described 506 5000 9 Synchronous Palmer et al [39] Total curriculum delivery N/A 32,685 N/A Asynchronous Pentiak et al [40] No explicit cost methodology/technique described [48] No explicit cost methodology/technique described 70 21,000 273 Asynchronous Thomas et al [49] No explicit cost methodology/technique described 49 44,986 803 Asynchronous de Ruijter et al [50] No explicit cost methodology/technique described 33 3732 103 Asynchronous Williams et al [52] Did not report total cost 38 N/A 679 Asynchronous Young et al [53] Did not report total cost 148 N/A 48 Asynchronous Zhou et al [54] a These studies are given the prefix "SUM" to indicate that this group represents a summary of costs without a comparator; the prefix and number can be used to provide a unique ID to refer to studies. b N/A: not available/applicable.…”

“…RenderX was of low cost but had no or limited evidence of self-reported educational impact [13,16]. The second group demonstrated that eLearning was of low cost and had a high self-reported education impact [23,[30][31][32][33][34][43][44][45][48][49][50][52][53][54]. A third group [19,22,26,39,40] demonstrated that eLearning was of high cost and had a high self-reported educational impact.…”

“…A second group of studies demonstrate eLearning as having low cost and high educational impact [23,[30][31][32][33][34][43][44][45][48][49][50][52][53][54]. Of this set, Likic et al [30], McConnell et al [32], McDuffie et al [33], de Ruijter et al [50], Moreno-Ger et al [34], Thomas et al [49], Williams et al [52], and Young et al [53] each represent online courses making use of asynchronous online learning at low cost per learner (below US $68/learner). The key issue among the studies in this literature cluster is that although they may provide evidence of low cost per learner, without a comparison point to comparable face-to-face delivery, there is no way to assert with any certainty that eLearning is a lower-cost option.…”

Evaluation of a MOOC to promote information literacy: first evaluation results

“…For an Australian study, conducted in cooperation with the OpenLearning platform, an evaluation form was embedded directly into the MOOCs to collect and analyse participants' attitudes and the perceived usefulness (Rawlings et al, 2017). A MOOC on literature searching for health libraries was evaluated by asking participants to fill out a feedback form at the end of the MOOC to derive recommendations for future projects (Young et al, 2017). The most common approach to evaluate IL skills are standardized questionnaires (Beile, 2008).…”