Participating Faculty: Barbara DeRose, Cindy Hill, Linda Sinclair
Course: Nursing Intensive: Managing Health & Illness Across Care Environments (NURS B444)
Department of Community Health Systems
Curriculum Internationalization Effort
IU School of Nursing (IUSON) is actively internationalizing its curriculum in order to prepare students to become aware of global health issues and practices in other countries. In an effort to provide meaningful global experiences to students who may not have the opportunity to travel abroad, the course Nursing Intensive: Managing Health & Illness Across Care Environments offers a clinical component that is locally based and provides immersion experiences with immigrant/refugee populations. Students enrolled in this clinical component share what they have learned with members of the entire didactic group through a formal presentation.
“
Witnessing student growth is the most satisfying aspect of this experience. Many of our nursing students come from rural communities and have not had first-hand experience interacting with persons form other cultures. With the help of technology, they can be transported to another country and hear how their counterparts deal with healthcare issues. It has never been more important than now, during the coronavirus pandemic, to share information globally in order to protect and preserve humanity. This type of experience will help prepare our students to cope with global health issues in the future.
Professor Barbara deRoseIn addition to the clinical experience, all students enrolled in this didactic course meet in a virtual conference with nursing schools from Spain and Mexico. The conference is recorded to maximize the number of students who can benefit from the project. Each semester, approximately 150 IUSON nursing students have access to the recording. During the virtual conference, each school presents the answers to three health related questions from their country’s perspective. In this way, students are exposed to similarities and differences in healthcare between the countries. The participating schools are encouraged to have a post conference reflection session to discuss what has been learned from the experience.
Benefit to the Student
In the clinical component, students are directly immersed into the immigrant/refugee world to witness barriers in accessing healthcare. In the virtual component, students see health care through a global lens using technology to hear directly from their foreign peers.
“
Gaining insight into other countries' health related issues and how their health system works.
Benefit to the School
The greatest benefit of a virtual exchange is that it is an effective way to expose students to thinking through a global lens. It can lead to future projects between partner universities, and it models possibilities for other instructors in the School of Nursing or other schools at IUPUI.
