Nursing students’ experiences and perceptions of an innovative graduate level healthcare grand challenge course: a qualitative study

Nursing leaders are increasingly required to create and implement innovative solutions to address challenges in the workplace. However, the present-day education of graduate nurses may not adequately prepare them for entrepreneurial approaches to problem solving required in today’s complex healthcare environments. To fill this gap, we designed, implemented, and evaluated a Healthcare Grand Challenge course for graduate nurses interested in developing their leadership skills. Following the course, students were invited to participate in a qualitative research study to explore their experiences and perceptions of the course and identify how they used the knowledge and skills developed through the course in their leadership practices. This study provides key lessons for future offerings of grand challenge courses while highlighting the influence of grand challenge courses on current and future nursing leadership practice.

Reflections of First Year Nursing Students: The Tango Tower Experience

First year nursing students at Laurentian University are taught self-reflection in the first semester of their program and continue to practice these skills throughout the following years of the program to assist in further developing self-awareness. This promotes a beginning understanding of the self-assessment required for quality assurance of their own practice as mandated by the College of Nurses of Ontario (2015). The purpose of this research was to determine the personal learning and team building skills of first year nursing students participating in an outdoor challenge course, namely, the Tango Tower. The rationale for this research involved the idea that the outdoor challenge course presented a learning opportunity to enhance personal self-awareness and team building skills. This qualitative study involved nursing students who completed self-reflections focusing on how they felt before, during, and after the challenge course experience. 16 first year nursing students consented to have their self-reflections reviewed for this research. A thematic analysis of these reflections demonstrated that the students became more self-aware in how they encounter new situations, learned to trust peers, and improved their communication and team building skills. Implications of this research are that results may be used to inform educators and facilitators in promoting the use of the outdoor challenge course to facilitate student learning, and also to potentially enhance interprofessional student learning by having a variety of professional students involved in team building activities.

Network-Based Approach to Assessment of Cognitive Skills

Cognitive Assessment Redesign (CAR) project is an institution-wide, network-based approach to the development of cognitive skills in undergraduate education. This project aims to encourage first and fourth-year instructors to align skill development through the design of course assessments, to enhance cognitive skill acquisition and provide a measurement of learning. The learning outcomes for the project are framed and operationalized using the language and dimensions from the Valid Assessment of Learning in Undergraduate Education (VALUE) rubrics. An assessment redesign network was created, matching assessment facilitators who have disciplinary and educational expertise with instructors to develop authentic assessments of student learning. One of the goals of the network is to encourage sustained participation and collaboration, and to build progression in teaching and learning throughout the institution. The project also includes a standardized test for comparison to course assessment outcomes. Testing at the fourth-year level has been dependent on the use of incentives for student participation. Although recruiting instructors from the faculty of Engineering and Applied Science was initially a challenge, course instructors have reported various successes stemming from participation in the project.

The Challenge Course Experience Questionnaire: A Facilitator’s Assessment Tool

Challenge course programs influence a variety of psychological, social, and educational outcomes. Yet, many challenges exist when measuring challenge course outcomes like logistical constraints and a lack of specific assessment tools. This study piloted and tested an assessment tool designed for facilitators to measure participant outcomes in challenge course programs. Data collection occurred in three separate but related studies with participants in two different challenge course environments from two regions of the United States. Through confirmatory factor analysis, a two-factor structure in challenge course participation was supported. The Challenge Course Experience Questionnaire (CCEQ) consists of challenge course participants’ (a) individual experience and (b) feelings of group support. During the first study, the structure was created and initial evidence of reliability was indicated. The second study examined the structure and reliability with a similar population. The third study confirmed the structure and reliability using a different population and challenge course program. The CCEQ is a preliminary step toward helping challenge course professionals improve their programming through statistical evaluation of desired outcomes.

Short- and Long-term Retention of Challenge Course Outcomes: A Classroom-based Longitudinal Study

The purpose of this study was to examine the retention of challenge course outcomes with the addition of intentional follow-up activities. The Challenge Course Experience Questionnaire (CCEQ) was administered to 101 participants in an introductory college course. The sample was divided into two separate groups: experimental group (EG; n = 67) and control group (CG; n = 34). Both groups completed a classroom-based challenge course program. Participants in the EG also included guided reflection-based activities throughout the semester and a facilitator-led activity. The CG only participated in the initial challenge course program. All participants significantly increased in CCEQ variables immediately following the program. However, the three-month follow-up revealed that the majority of variables decreased to preprogram levels for both groups. However, the variables had larger decreases in the CG. These findings have implications for challenge course programming in terms of long-term outcome retention. Suggestions for facilitators and future research are provided.

Recognition Method Applied to Smart Dump 9 Using Multi-Beam 3D LiDAR for the Tsukuba Challenge

[abstFig src='/00280004/03.jpg' width='300' text='Smart Dump 9 started at the Tsukuba Challenge 2015 final' ] The Tsukuba Challenge course includes a pedestrian road in which walkers, bicyclists, and mobile robots coexist. As a result, mobile robots encounter potentially dangerous situations when faced with moving bicycles. Navigating the challenge course involves locating target individuals in the search area and paying attention to the safety of bicyclists. Target individuals involve those who typically wear a cap and a refracted vest and are seated on chairs. This study proposes a method to identify pedestrians, bicyclists, and seated individuals by using a 3D LiDAR on Smart Dump 9. The SVM method was employed to identify the target seated individuals. An experiment was conducted on the challenge course to illustrate the advantages of the proposed method.