Aaron Herndon

Feedback Literacy in Clinical Teaching

We are investigating student interaction with feedback and feedback literacy in students and staff in the context of veterinary clinical education. What interventions can we develop to teach or enhance feedback literacy in students and staff? Can these interventions apply to clinical teachers in extra-mural placements? Can improved feedback literacy be seen in improved student outcomes? Projects could easily be expanded to translational projects across other healthcare disciplines within UQ (Medicine, Dental, Midwifery, Physiotherapy, Nursing).

Capstone Assessment of Final Year Veterinary Students

Graduates of the BVSc are considered "practice ready" for licensure in Australia. In order to ensure that students have met the program learning objectives and can demonstrate the requisite technical skills, clinical skills, and knowledge base the School of Veterinary Science re-designed our assessment format and instituted a new "capstone" examination administered to all students at the end of their clinical year. This project aims to investigate the performance of the assessment, student and staff opinions about the new assessment structure, and impacts of this assessment on the students and curriculum.

Students must have a keen interest in medical education, curriculum design, assessment pedagogy, and skills assessment. This project is designed around assessment of the BVSc, but the outcomes are easily applicable to many other disciples within the health sciences and beyond. There is tremendous opportunity for collaborative and inter-disciplinary translation of this work. Candidates from education, medicine, physiotherapy, dentistry, nursing, or midwifery would all find significant overlap between our respective disciplines and all are welcome to contact our research team.

Depending on the interest of a candidate, aspects of this project may be suitable for a masters-level degree or may be considered suitable for PhD-level research for the right canditate.

Relationship Centred Practice and the Longitudinal Integrated Clerkship in the Teaching Hospital

The concept of the Relationship Centred Practice is well-established in the field of the human health-sciences. However this concept is infrequently encountered in the veterinary setting. Beginning in 2021, the veterinary teaching hospital has begun a transition to RCP as our healthcare delivery model. At the same time, several of our internal rotations were merged to create a longitudinal integrated clinical clerkship. This project aims to investigate the outcomes of this shift in teaching delivery and practice organisation on the program outcomes of our Bachelor of Veterinary Science(Hons) students and the veterinary teaching hospital. There are a number of projects that can be considered as a part of this larger body of work. Given the translational nature of this project, we welcome interest from candidates in the fields of education, medicine, nursing, physiotherapy, dentistry, and midwifery.