Community Members’ and Student Perspectives of a Community-based Interprofessional Educational Experience: A Panel Presentation

The core centerpiece of interprofessional practice is the patient/client or community. Therefore, it is foundational to include the community in interprofessional education opportunities. Since the 2017-18 academic year, pre-professional students have engaged in a community-based education experience known as the Health Partner (HP) project. HPs are individuals living in the community who are willing to support the education of students as they develop interprofessional collaborative practice skills. The proposed Seminar will provide an overview of the HP project, student perspectives of their interprofessional learning, and HP’s perspectives of their engagement as an educator.
Students interprofessionally develop interview questions to ask during a series of three HP visits to learn more about the HP’s health, health goals and healthcare lived experiences. Based upon the information provided by the HP, student teams develop a list of community resources to support the HP’s health goals. Student teams share their learning through a presentation at the end of the academic year. During the past academic year (2021-22), HPs were invited to attend the presentations.
The seminar will include a panel consisting of two first-year students (dental and medicine) and a HP. The medical student is an experienced student having a previous PharmD and MBA degree, and the dental student is a novice pre-licensure health professional student. The HP has engaged in the community-based interprofessional education experience for the past three academic years. Each panel member will highlight a topic of their interest as related to learning and engagement. Then the audience will be able to ask questions of the panel members through a moderated session.
After listening and engaging with the panel members, participants can reflect upon opportunities to create community-based interprofessional education experiences within their own institutions. Additionally, specific to the role of a community member, the audience will have a better understanding of how the HP perceives their role and what value they derive from their participation. Having this understanding is important in the recruitment and repeated engagement of community members. An aim of the HP project is for students to practice interprofessional collaborative practice skills in a safe learning environment. The two students on the panel have varied educational backgrounds. Understanding the similarities and differences of learning can help support the development of meaningful community-based experiences for a diverse group of learners.
After attending this session, the learner will be able to:
1. Identify key processes of identifying and engaging community members as educators in interprofessional experiences.
2. Compare and contrast community-based interprofessional learning from a novice and experienced student perspective.
3. Summarize the perspective of a community member as an educator engaged in a community-based interprofessional learning experience.