The world of education is changing, and ever since 2020, that need for change has impacted education at every level, location, and field. With all forms of institutes of education shifting their formats to adjust to the necessities of remote learning, questions regarding how to do this right have emerged more and more.
In figuring out how to make remote education effective, a paradox easily emerges: how can you ensure remote learning, precisely online, can satiate the need for direct, individualised support and guidance that was until recently only considered possible in person?
EDU spoke with one of its experts, Dr. Michal Lapides, on this topic, and overall on EDU as a digital institute of higher education. We asked Dr. Lapides on his thoughts on EDU’s quality of education, and were pleased to hear such positive views: “EDU with its concept is quite a pioneer in medical education. It is giving the students a big flexibility, but at the same time they have amazing support and professional assistance during their education. And all of that is happening in the online world, which is quite amazing.”
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There’s nothing quite as effective in the world of education as learning from, with, and amongst experts in their fields. What is more, it is highly interesting to hear about these experts’ experiences during their studies and seeing how that applies to present day. For instance, Dr. Lapides shared on what he would change from his medical education: “I would’ve liked my faculty to try to focus on the most important material, and maybe as well try to focus more on practical skills and experience.”
Thus, it comes as no surprise that when asking him about the importance of early clinical practice, as well as the specific didactic model that EDU offers, he elaborated further on why he considers this all as extremely valuable:
Early start seeing patients
Dr. Lapides considers that “Medicine is a specific field where you can’t study everything in the lecture room or library or your study room. There is an interaction with real patients in the hospital and that is actually the only way how to learn clinical medicine. But at the same time, to understand what is going on in the clinical setting, this is without some theory not possible.” In essence, it is only by seeing real patients, that students can understand how knowledge is important and can see how they can learn to help patients.
As Dr. Lapides remarked, at EDU, students have theoretical blocks that last 8 weeks, and then “the students are happy to go to the clinical rotations, where they can see real patients, and actually get motivated to learn more stuff because they can see that what they do, what they study actually is important for their future work. I really like that EDU students have the possibility to really, from the first year, start to see real clinical rotations, and patients, and to interact with those patients.”
Didactic model
Regarding EDU’s chosen didactic model, Dr. Michal Lapides reflected on students’ learning experiences:
“Students tend to study a lot of information, a lot of material, but eventually they forget most of it. So I think EDU is doing great work with its evidence-based methods, so the students will actually not only learn the material, but they will work with the material and work with the clinical cases. And in this way they can definitely remember more material than with maybe just old-school study methods.”
So what exactly makes the EDU learning experience so unique and effective? According to Dr. Lapides: “I think EDU is in this way quite innovative that they try to focus on crucial skills and crucial knowledge, and maybe not overload students with unnecessary information and maybe focus on the most important material.”
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Looking back at how education has changed ever since the COVID-19 pandemic, it becomes evident that some institutions have succeeded at remote learning more than others. As Dr. Lapides pointed out: “I think it (EDU) has a big future, and I am sure there will be many (other) faculties which will actually follow the concept of EDU.”
EDU stands out here because we were prepared for the adversity that would come with a crisis such as the pandemic. EDU’s programme in medicine was already remote-proof, with state-of-the-art technology, a key digital learning platform, and an excellent network and community of tutors, mentors, and experts (professors and lecturers) to support students.
“It may be a paradox that they study in the online world, but at the same time, maybe they even have a better support and assistance than in a normal (traditional) faculty.”
