The Penn State Symposium for Teaching and Learning with Technology is both an annual event and a year-round online discussion of ways that faculty and staff are using technology to enhance teaching, learning, and research.
The problem presented was to offer our World Campus nursing students the same opportunities as their resident instruction counterparts in the new Nursing Forensic Certificate. We had exhausted our search for an adequate off-the-shelf autopsy solution to offer our online students and it seemed that we were embarking on new territory. Therefore, we created our own experience to capture the learning objectives. The faculty was well versed in the forensic process of an autopsy, but as the discussion moved forward, it became clear we needed a few more experts and they needed to see through students’ eyes. We needed to capture the entire experience and as a result, the team attended autopsies and then set out to create our own multimedia experience.
Our story tells the journey of the faculty’s vision coming to fruition with a truly collaborative effort of a forensic nurse, a forensic pathologist, the College of Nursing, Continuing Education and Outreach, Mount Nittany Medical Center, Hershey Medical Center, World Campus, and WPSU to successfully placing all the pieces of the puzzle in alignment. The outcome means students enter an engaging case study to learn firsthand how to follow forensic protocol as part of a team.
We will present the initial vision and discuss all the logistics put into play to pull off a well-planned experience for our students. Learning strategies, challenges, best practices, and student evaluation will be presented, as well as the many impactful educational elements that were created, which the audience will have the chance to interact with.