MSCHE/ACOE Self Study

 Refractive  Visual perception/sensorimotor  Public health/community optometry  Clinical examination  Clinic  Integrative

The first four tracks are organized around common content while the last three are more skill centered. The implementation of each track is facilitated by two faculty members designated by the dean as track coordinators. Appendix B-8b outlines how the track coordinators, department chairs, course coordinators and curriculum committee work together to oversee the administration of the curriculum. As initial implementation of the curriculum nears completion, the role of track coordinator, which originated with the new curriculum, is under review. (As discussed on page 60, the College’s academic structure is undergoing a comprehensive assessment.) The curriculum is published on the College’s Web site (http://www.sunyopt.edu/academics/od_curriculum.shtml) as are the individual course descriptions (http://www.sunyopt.edu/academics/od_course.shtml). (These documents can be found in Appendices B-9a and B-9b.) Syllabi and outlines for courses are posted on Moodle, the College’s course management system. Faculty members as well as students have access to all the courses on Moodle. The capability to search the entire curriculum on Moodle for a particular topic is under development. Although the recent implementation of the new curriculum limits the data available for its assessment, assessment processes are in place and ongoing. It is already evident that the new curriculum has successfully addressed most of the objectives put forward in the dean’s original charge to the Curriculum Committee and that support Goal 1.3 of the Strategic Plan. Specifically, the number of courses per term has been substantially reduced; students are in clinic earlier and required to integrate and apply critically what they learn in the classroom to these clinical experiences (during Integrative Seminar ); there is greater emphasis on small group (student-centered) learning; and there are significantly more opportunities for the integration of basic and clinical sciences (particularly in the integration track, which runs through all four years of the curriculum). A major goal of the new curriculum is to integrate basic sciences with clinical cases. To assess its success, a case-driven integration examination has been developed. This examination, which is administered in the third year, uses clinical case scenarios to test the student’s ability to integrate basic science concepts with clinical conditions. The examination was piloted with the Class of 2010 and subsequently modified and administered to the Class of 2011. Performance of the Class of 2011, the class most recently trained under the old curriculum, will

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