Bachelor degree distance

Distance education has been used in health professional education programs to provide continuing and advanced education. Distance education in physical therapy has been limited. This article describes the use of distance education methods to deliver a transitional bachelor's degree to master's degree program for a cohort of two classes of physical therapy students. The 6-month program allowed a total of 26 students to receive a master's degree while working full-time and residing off campus. Student feedback indicated that the program met goals of advancing their education, increasing their marketability, and being affordable. The use of a variety of media to deliver the program and student comments about the methods are described. J Allied Health. 2002; 31:217-221.

THE UNITED STATES Distance Learning Association has defined distance education as "the acquisition of knowledge and skills through mediated information and instruction ... encompassing all technologies and other forms of learning at a distance."1 Distance education encompasses a variety of methods to accomplish educational objectives, including print-based media; audiotapes; interactive video; use of the Internet; and brief, intense blocks of on-campus time. Distance education has been used in health professional education to provide professional training2-6; continuing education,7,8 and various certificate and degree programs, such as audiology,7 nursing,9-12 and laboratory medicine.13

Distance education in physical therapy education has been more limited. A few programs, notably the University of Kentucky, have used interactive video for lecture delivery and classroom activities to students at a site distant from the main campus.14 Barden et al.15 used interactive video to teach a class on hand evaluation to practicing physical therapists and showed the ability of this medium to develop advanced skills in the learners. Physical therapists in the U.S. military have adapted an Internet tool, WebBoard, to foster communication and training among their ranks worldwide.16 No published reports to date have described the use of distance education methods in a degree transition program in physical therapy.

A transitional degree program has been defined by the American Physical Therapy Association (APTA) as "the culmination of a structured postprofessional educational experience that results in the structured augmentation of knowledge, skills, and behaviors at a level consistent with the current professional education standards."17 Changes in the physical therapy profession have led to a push to move the professional degree to the doctoral level.18 In this change, there is a strong impetus to provide a transitional degree for currently practicing physical therapists who have bachelor's or master's degrees. According to the APTA, concomitant with the shift in professional education degree status must be a mechanism for affordable, accessible ways for the practitioner to obtain the new degree.17-19 Similar degree shifts have been made in other health professional educational programs, including nursing,10-12 pharmacy, and laboratory medicine.13 Specifically, programs have been offered to upgrade degree credentials from the previous level to the current one.11-13 Various distance education methods have been used to offer transition programs to students who are working full-time or have family responsibilities that preclude participation in a traditional, on-campus program.10-13

In 1996, the Division of Physical Therapy at West Virginia University changed its professional educational program from a bachelor's degree to a master's degree. In the first 2 years of that transition, a unique program was developed to offer currently enrolled baccalaureate students at the time of the transition the opportunity to obtain the master's degree credential after the completion of the baccalaureate program. This article describes the process of identifying and designing the curriculum for the program, discusses issues related to the use of distance education methods to deliver the program, and describes student feedback about the program.

Background and Development of Program

The first step in developing the transitional program was to create a new faculty position to undertake the responsibilities of a coordinator. Next, the mission statements and curricula of the old bachelor's degree program and the new master's degree program were examined to determine changes in content and philosophy that would need to be incorporated into the transitional program. Areas of expanded or new content in the master's degree program included geriatric physical therapy, pediatric physical therapy, exercise physiology, radiology, laboratory medicine, and psychosocial aspects of disability. Philosophical differences included increased focus on developing independent and lifelong learners, the use of case-based group discussions, and new roles in peer and community teaching. These aspects reflected current standards for content and philosophy of education as reflected in the APTAs A Normative Model of Physical Therapist Professional Education.20

Interviews with currently enrolled baccalaureate students led to the development of a group of potential student goals for participation in the transition program. These goals helped to guide decision making regarding the use of distance education methods to deliver the program and served as a means to assess the success of the program (Table 1).

The coordinator worked with the program chair and faculty who would be the content experts to deliver the program. The final program that was developed used a combination of print-based materials, interactive television, Internet, intensive on-campus blocks, and individual written projects completed at a distant location. The entire program consisted of 15 credits in the spring semester and 6 credits in the summer semester over a total of 6 months.

STUDENT PARTICIPANTS

Students who were enrolled in the baccalaureate program at the time of transition to the master's program were offered the opportunity to participate after completion of the baccalaureate program. Of students, 10 of 27 (9 women and 1 man) in the class of 1998 and 16 of 30 (15 women and 1 man) in the class of 1999 elected to participate. Students in 1998 had a mean age of 23 years (ranges 22-28 years). The 1999 students had a mean age of 24 years (range, 22-26 years). All students in 1998 and all except one student in 1999 were employed full-time. Most resided and worked in rural areas of West Virginia and lived a 2- to 6-hour drive away from the campus.

DISTANCE EDUCATION METHODS USED

In the first year, a weekly conference was held via interactive television from six locations throughout the state. This conference was held to present patient cases and discuss clinical problems from the students' current practice experiences. Students took turns presenting a patient case from their own practice that illustrated one of the principles of their study and guided discussion regarding the case. This seminar allowed the students to share in the case-based learning that was a major aspect of the master's degree program. Because of difficulties with access to the technology and student frustration with the technology, this seminar was not continued in the second year. Case-based presentations were made during on-campus blocks instead.

On-campus time was used for lectures and laboratory experiences in geriatrics and pediatrics and time for the students to act as laboratory assistants for a gross anatomy course, meeting part of their requirement for peer instruction. For the first year, students were on campus for two week-long sessions in the spring semester and 1 week in the summer. In the second year, this time was decreased to two 3-day blocks during the spring semester. These changes were made in response to student request and were made possible by the addition of Web-based material. In the second year, the exercise physiology module was transitioned from classroom lecture to a website, decreasing the need for students to be on campus for classes. Remaining lectures in pediatrics and radiology continued to be delivered on campus because of instructor preference. Communication between the program coordinator and the students was primarily via mailings and telephone calls, although the second class of students had more access to e-mail and used that method much more than the first class.

OUTCOME ASSESSMENT