Exploring Professional Development Needs of Educators in the Health Sciences Professions

Abstract

An increasing number of institutions of higher education are clustering their health sciences schools into a common unit. Therefore, it is imperative that the individual faculty development units assume new mandates to meet faculty development needs for stakeholders across these disciplines. Critical to providing current and relevant professional development activities is an awareness of the needs of academicians, including common as well as discipline-speciic needs. Hence, the aim of this study was to explore the extent to which factors such as discipline, rank, gender, education, and years as an academician impact on perceived needs for faculty development. In February 2012, a cross-sectional survey of the perceived faculty development needs of academicians in the health sciences unit of a Canadian university was conducted using an online assessment tool. A total of 133 out of 1,409 potential participants completed the survey, for a response rate of 9.4%. The indings revealed more similarities than differences in terms of perceived faculty development needs. In addition, differences were found across all health professions schools and in factors such as discipline, academic rank, education, gender, and years as an academician. These indings suggest that faculty development and educational specialists should understand the shared as well as the unique needs of the individual health sciences schools in planning their professional development services. Dr. Schönwetter is Director of Educational

Needs assessment for faculty development at an Egyptian medical school: a triangulation approach

“…The purpose and scope of needs assessment must be guided by a clear conceptual framework, the purpose and scope of prospective FD programs, and institutional strategies and resources. 2,16 Exploratory interviews during developing the survey in this study revealed that medical faculty at Sohag University conceptualize discipline-specific development as an essential part of FD construct. This area has commonly been overlooked in the literature on FD and its needs assessment with the notion that faculty are usually hired based on their discipline (content) expertise; hence, FD should focus on other areas.…”

“…Indeed, most published FD studies addressed teaching, research, and leadership/administration aspects. 8,[15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] However, the essence of FD is continually supporting all roles of faculty members dedicated to meeting the goals, mission, and vision of the institution. 3 Teaching, research, and social service (including healthcare), which form the core mission of any medical school, require discipline (content) expertise.…”

“…from 9.4% to 81.9%. 8,[15][16][17][18][19][20] Given the number of the target population (793), a response rate of 54.7% should be adequate under stringent conditions. 26 However, nonrespondents (whatever the reasons) remain a source of bias; this is an inherent concern in any study with voluntary participation.…”

“…Published surveys have discrepancies in defining FD construct in terms of focusing on certain FD needs domains (e.g., teaching, research, and/or leadership and career development) but ignoring others (e.g., discipline-specific development); moreover, delivery, scheduling, advertising, and motivation preferences are not consistently included. 2,8,[15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22][23][24] Since proper and consistent construct interpretation is the basis for survey development and validation, authors interviewed 27 faculty members to explore understanding and conceptualization of FD construct; this emphasized all FD domains described in the literature including discipline-specific development. 23,24 Accordingly, FD was defined in this study as "the range of planned activities that institutions utilize to continuously promote faculty in their essential roles: teaching/learning, research/scholarship, leadership/administration, career development, and discipline-specific activities".…”

Factors predicting identity as educators and openness to improve: an exploratory study

“…(Items used in each scale are provided in Data or upon request from the primary author.) The items were based on similar items used in surveys published in the literature . Participants rated statements on a 6‐point Likert scale (1 = ‘strongly disagree’, 2 = ‘disagree’, 3 = ‘somewhat disagree’, 4 = ‘somewhat agree’, 5 = ‘agree’, and 6 = ‘strongly agree’), but participants were also given the option of ‘choose not to answer’.…”