Continuing professional development (CPD) has become more significant for all sectors of the library and information profession over recent years. Increasing user expectations, coupled with demands for quality, accountability and efficacy of practice, emphasise the need to keep abreast of new knowledge. However, budgetary constraints and lack of time often prevent staff from attending training courses to develop their knowledge and skills.
The CILIP Health Executive Advisory Group report, Future Proofing the Profession,1 argues that developments within healthcare library and information services are relevant to the profession more generally. Certainly this is true within CPD where the ‘NHS has supported work-based learning as one of several ways to improve skills and provide opportunities for lifelong-learning for its workforce’.2
Demands on NHS knowledge services have become increasingly sophisticated, requiring health information professionals’ roles to evolve to include knowledge management, training in information- and evidence-seeking skills, involvement in clinical decision making and implementation of policies.3
Additionally, many health library units in the UK operate with a staff of four or less, many working part-time, making it difficult to arrange appropriate staff cover and preventing information professionals from leaving the workplace for extended periods without compromising service availability. The Folio programme, sponsored by the National Library for Health Librarian Development Programme, is a potential response to such challenges.
What is Folio?
Folio (Facilitated Online Learning as an Interactive Opportunity) is a CPD programme of 12 online courses. Courses are free and available for all information professionals who support staff working within the NHS. Participants thus include those working in academic libraries, health charities and professional associations in addition to those actually employed by the NHS. Folio courses are delivered electronically and are designed to enable participants to undertake training in their own workplace and to learn alongside their day-to-day work.
Folio was devised in 2002 by Andrew Booth, Director of Information Resources at the School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR), University of Sheffield, and Alison Turner, Library Partnerships Co-ordinator for the National Library for Health. Following three successful pilot courses during 2003, the NLH commissioned a team at ScHARR to deliver a two-year programme between April 2004 and March 2006.
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Scenario B – Out of Contact
You are the facilitator for a small discussion group, part of a larger course. One of the group members, Ian Communicado, hasn’t been participating in group activities. Furthermore you have just received an email from Ian’s buddy who says that they have sent several email messages to him over the last couple of weeks but without a single reply.
- What possible explanations can you suggest for the behaviour being described in this scenario?
- What possible strategies or solutions can you suggest for addressing this behaviour?
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Awful puns
Imagine that you have enrolled on the fourth Folio course, ‘Introduction to E-Learning’. It is Day 17 so you are just over halfway through the six-week taught component of the course. You know from the course timetable on the Folio website that today is scheduled for a ‘Motivating e-learners mini-exercise’. Just before 11 am you receive the daily message from the Folio team. You are pointed to five brief scenarios exploring difficult e-learner behaviour, accessible from the Folio website. You are asked to select one scenario and answer two brief questions. You pick Scenario B (see box).
Pausing only momentarily to groan at the characteristically awful pun in the name of the non-participant you print out today’s message. During snatched moments of reflection on your abbreviated lunch-break and at mid-afternoon tea you consider your response. Why isn’t Ian replying? What might be the root causes? Is he ill? Overworked? Perhaps upset? How will you find out? Will you tackle it formally or informally? Who else might you involve?
Just before you leave work you make a brief response in your portfolio, downloaded as a Word document template by Folio participants as a way of recording contributions to each task. You also check that you have completed the main substantive task for the course; you are ready to submit an embryonic e-learning resource to the Folio course team by tomorrow’s deadline. Apparently, prototypes devised by yourself and the other four individuals in your small ‘buddy group’ will be loaded into a web ‘gallery’. Later you and your buddy group colleagues will view and assess the gallery for another anonymous group while a third group does the same for your gallery.
Finally you note in your diary for tomorrow to visit the audio recording and Powerpoint slides for the telephone presentation given by Barbara Allan, author of E-learning and Teaching in Library and Information Services.4 The live presentation was given last Wednesday when you were on a day’s leave.
You now have a flavour of both the content and the flexibility of the Folio programme. While the exact format of each course and its associated tasks varies according to the topic, the blend of exercises and interactions described above is fairly typical. To these can be added quizzes to check understanding, competitions for light relief and surveys or other voting exercises.
The Folio curriculum
Folio forms part of the NLH Librarian Development Programme, established in 2000 to provide support for librarians moving into new roles. The programme focuses on development of skills in health informatics, information communication technology (ICT) skills, knowledge management, managerial skills, learning and teaching skills, evidence-based librarianship, epidemiological skills and processes of clinical decision making.5-7
In 2003, the LDP sponsored ScHARR to conduct a training needs analysis for information professions working within the NHS. The report8 analyses existing provision using a framework devised with the mnemonic Compliant. It found that health information professionals primarily required technical skills (36.5 per cent), followed by management skills (17.6 per cent), professional skills (16.8 per cent) and contextual knowledge (12.7 per cent). Course topics for the Folio programme are selected by a national Folio Curriculum Development Group, and are informed by these findings.
Although all Folio courses are contextualised to the health sector, course topics are of general relevance to all information sectors.
Folio courses are delivered primarily by email, utilising two Jiscmail distribution lists.9 Jiscmail not only allows easy distribution of messages to all participants but also maintains an archive of messages. This enables participants who have missed one or more messages to catch up with course progress.
Links to this archive are provided from a set of web pages created for each course and linked from the NeLH Folio website.10 Web pages contain original course materials compiled by the Folio team (such as briefings, case studies etc). Web links provided within the email messages ensure that emails are not too lengthy. The website also enables those who are not formally registered on the course to access the website and to view materials on such topics as ‘Managing change’, ‘Designing and delivering information skills’ ‘Training and planning and conducting an information needs analysis’ (see inset).
Students on e-learning courses commonly cite lack of motivation and feelings of isolation as common reasons for withdrawing.11 To retain students, effective facilitation and student support is essential. The challenge for the Folio programme is to create courses that support the educational and social needs of the participants. A variety of teaching materials and activities is used to create interest and motivate the participants, whatever their learning styles.
Folio courses include both practical and pedagogic exercises. Practical exercises focus on participants’ experience and how it relates to the course topic. For example, participants reflect on how the course topic applies to their local circumstances, or develop an action plan for their own service. Typically such exercises are based on a fictional case study that simulates real-life circumstances. Such exercises involve problem-solving that participants can relate to their own roles. Where participants are required to create a piece of work, such as an e-learning resource or an information skills training course programme, they can subsequently adapt and develop this for use within their own organisation. Practical exercises are complemented by more pedagogic activities such as guided reading and briefings offering theoretical perspectives.
To ensure that content is enjoyable as well as educational, courses include informal exercises such as icebreakers (e.g. ‘Which character from history would you least like to train and why’), quizzes, votes and competitions.
Chat and humour
Folio course facilitators adopt an informal, sometimes humorous, tone to create a closer student-teacher relationship. They often illustrate their messages with anecdotes and discussions reflecting their own struggles and successes. This enables participants to feel confident when asking for help or guidance. To promote further interaction between the student and the facilitator, designated ‘drop-in’ sessions allow personalised feedback via email, telephone or online ‘chat’ using a Jiscmail discussion forum.
As students may feel detached during e-learning courses, most courses include a ‘live’ telephone lecture. Lectures are provided by well-known experts within each course topic. Participants ‘dial in’ to listen to telephone lectures at a set time and date. Presentation slides for lectures are made available online and recordings provided for any who miss the ‘live’ sessions.
The ‘loneliness of the long-distance learner’ is often reported during e-learning courses.12 To counter this, each student works collaboratively with four or five course participants as part of a ‘buddy group’ system. Participants also use email to interact with the whole group during icebreaker and discussion-type exercises.
To support the administrative needs of students the course team provides an enquiries service. Participants are told how to access FAQs web pages providing general information about each course, such as requirements for successful completion. Where questions are not addressed participants can contact the course team.13 All enquiries are answered within 48 hours.
Portfolio assessment
As befits a CPD programme, Folio courses are assessed through submission of a portfolio.14 A portfolio template for each course is made available from the course website. To complete the course and receive one of three certificates (distinction, honours pass and standard pass) participants must submit a largely complete portfolio to an accepted standard. Very rarely a fail is recorded; participants may choose to opt out from submitting a portfolio if they simply wish to benefit from course materials. Portfolios are assessed by the Folio team, with occasional involvement from an external module tutor.
During each course, participants record their work in their portfolio template. Provision of a two-week catch-up period following formal completion of the course allows them to address any gaps or to reflect further on exercises previously completed. Such flexibility is a key aspect of the courses. This catch-up period helps to ease participants’ anxieties should they miss tasks due to working part-time, work commitments, annual leave, etc. For extenuating circumstances, participants may ask for a further four-week extension to submit their portfolios.
Courses are evaluated using an online survey form available via the Jiscmail discussion facility. The evaluation assesses student opinions across such areas as satisfaction with the course, quality of course materials, usefulness of the buddy/group interaction, and quality of course facilitation. In addition, students are encouraged to make general comments about the course. Evaluation forms are available throughout the course to include the views of those who withdraw as well as those who complete the course.
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Folio courses
Management skills
- Making your case (Machiavel)
- Managing change for health information professionals (MCHIP)
- Project management (PM@5PM)
Professional skills
- Evaluating your service (Eval)
- The Folio customer care course (Frontier)
- Planning and conducting an information needs analysis (Pacina)
- Maximising the impact of your service (Maxim)
- Knowledge management (G2G)
Contextual skills
- Evidence-based librarianship (EBL)
- Information for social care (I4SC)
- Learning and teaching skills
- Designing and delivering information skills training courses (Infoskills)
- Introduction to e-learning (e-Folio)
The next three Folio courses will run
September 2005-March 2006.
These courses are:
- Managing for service quality
- Understanding the business of clinical care
- Evaluating information skills training courses
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Cohort of ‘Ex-Foliates’
Evaluation has revealed that most participants (typically around 70 per cent) find the e-learning courses enjoyable. A slightly higher percentage (between 70-75 per cent) agree that courses meet their stated objectives. Around 70 per cent would do further Folio courses and even larger numbers would recommend courses to colleagues. Indeed a small cohort of participants (popularly known as Ex-Foliates) have completed three, four or even five Folio courses.
The course team is committed to the value of e-learning but accept that it is not for everyone. Some participants view group interactions as an unwelcome hindrance to their progress through course materials while others view exchanges with others as an integral feature of the course. Everyone should try at least one Folio course to decide for themselves whether or not it is for them.
Folio courses have proved popular, with more than 300 members of library staff (including paraprofessionals on the Frontier customer care course) having enrolled on at least one of the nine full Folio courses to date. The added value of Folio materials is acknowledged by a related project designed to make course briefings, exercises and anonymised model answers available on a CD-Rom.
Due to the stipulations of the current Folio contract, none of the courses has been repeated, although demand frequently exceeds supply. With materials having already been created and courses designed, the potential to run repeat courses for a fraction of their original cost or to offer versions of the courses to other library sectors or other countries is a very real prospect.
References
1 Future Proofing the Profession: the report of the Health Executive Advisory Group. CILIP, 2004.
2 Ibid.
3 C. Urquhart, S. Spink and R. Thomas. Assessing Training and Professional Development Needs of Library Staff. Undertaken for National Library for Health, NHS Information Authority. Department of Information Studies, University of Wales, 2005.
4 B. Allan. E-learning and Teaching in Library and Information Services. Facet Publishing, 2002.
5 V. Fraser. ‘Continuing professional development in the NHS: what is to be done?’ Health Libraries Review, 16(4), 1999, pp. 268-270.
6 B. Toth et al. ‘National Electronic Library for Health: progress and prospects.’ Health Libraries Review, 17(1), 2000, pp. 46-50.
7 A. Turner et al. ‘A first class knowledge service: developing the National Electronic Library for Health.’ Health Information and Libraries Journal, 19(3), 2002, pp. 133-145.
8 www.nelh.nhs.uk/folio/cpd.pdf
9 Folio: www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/folio.html
and E-Folio www.jiscmail.ac.uk/lists/e-folio.html
10 www.nelh.nhs.uk/folio
11 J. Moshinskie. How to Keep E-learners from E-scaping. E-Lite Think Tank- White Paper No. 1, 2003 (http://business.baylor.edu/james_moshinskie/elite/elite%201%20-%20motivate.doc).
12 D. Eastmond. Alone but Together: adult distance study through computer conferencing. Hampton Press, 1995.
13 folio@sheffield.ac.uk
14 S. Stewart. ‘The place of portfolios within continuing professional development.’ In: C.S. Hong and D. Harrison. Tools for Continuing Professional Development. Key Books, 2004, pp.10-22.
Lynda Ayiku, Andrew Booth, Anthea Sutton and Alan O’Rourke are part of the School of Health and Related Research (ScHARR), University of Sheffield.