The Persistent Effects of Short-Term Peer Groups on Performance: Evidence from a Natural Experiment in Higher Education

This paper studies the persistent effects of short-term peer exposure on long-run performance in a college setting. I exploit the random assignment of undergraduates to peer groups during a mandatory orientation week and track the students’ performance over four years (until graduation). Assignment to orientation week groups with high levels of peer ability is associated with lower performance during the first year at college and a higher probability of early dropout. These adverse effects are driven entirely by the exposure of low-ability students to high-ability peers. Beyond the first year, exposure to higher peer ability during the orientation week negatively affects selection into the college’s most popular major (business administration) and final grade point average. Taken together, the findings suggest that the composition of short-term peer groups matters for individual choices and long-run performance outcomes. This paper was accepted by Yan Chen, decision analysis.

The Saint Mary’s Rape Chant

In September 2013 student leaders at Saint Mary’s University in Halifax, Nova Scotia, used a chant about the rape of underage girls as part of an Orientation Week activity for new students. The incident garnered national and international media coverage. In this article, we analyze and critique a selection of Canadian media articles published in the weeks after the rape chant was used. We draw on feminist analysis of post-feminism and the sexualization of youth cultures to show how, in their struggle to make sense of the incident, the media critique reiterates harmful discourses of youth, gender and sexuality while undermining deeper understanding of rape culture.

Start the Way You Want to Finish: An Intensive Diversity, Equity, Inclusion Orientation Curriculum in Undergraduate Medical Education

Problem: Medical students often feel unprepared to care for patients whose cultural backgrounds differ from their own. Programs in medical schools have begun to address health: inequities; however, interventions vary in intensity, effectiveness, and student experience. Intervention: The authors describe an intensive 2-day diversity, equity, and inclusion curriculum for medical students in their orientation week prior to starting formal classes. Rather than using solely a knowledge-based “cultural competence” or a reflective “cultural humility” approach, an experiential curriculum was employed that links directly to fundamental communication skills vital to interactions with patients and teams, and critically important to addressing interpersonal disparities. Specifically, personal narratives were incorporated to promote individuation and decrease implicit bias, relationship-centered skills practice to improve communication across differences, and mindfulness skills to help respond to bias when it occurs. Brief didactics highlighting student and faculty narratives of difference were followed by small group sessions run by faculty trained to facilitate sessions on equity and inclusion. Context: Orientation week for matriculating first-year students at a US medical school. Impact: Matriculating students highly regarded an innovative 2-day diversity, equity, and inclusion orientation curriculum that emphasized significant relationship-building with peers, in addition to core concepts and skills in diversity, equity, and inclusion. Lessons learned: This orientation represented an important primer to concepts, skills, and literature that reinforce the necessity of training in diversity, equity, and inclusion. The design team found that intensive faculty development and incorporating diversity concepts into fundamental communication skills training were necessary to perpetuate this learning. Two areas of further work emerged: (1) the emphasis on addressing racism and racial equity as paradigmatic belies further essential understanding of intersectionality, and (2) uncomfortable conversations about privilege and marginalization arose, requiring expert facilitation.

Novel Approach to Disseminate Educational Materials Using Technology

Introduction/Objective Our facility initiated a modification to an existing on-site Specialist in Blood Bank Technology and Transfusion Medicine (SBB) Program, in July 2018. The modification changed a local program to a hybrid on-site and distance learning program. The curriculum was established using a dynamic repository of recorded presentations (video/audio recordings and PowerPoint/audio presentations) as part of the self-paced, didactic educational portion of the program. The challenge was to provide a primary method for accessing the didactic portion of the program that would be flexible and available through a variety of venues. Our SBB Program was awarded $2,500 by the ASCP Foundation Laboratory Science Program Director Educational Grant in 2018 in support of modifying the current SBB program to a modified, hybrid on-site plus on-line program. Methods The grant provided the necessary seed money to purchase iPads, seen as the method for delivery of the educational materials. The Apple iPad® (Apple, Inc., One Apple Park Way, Cupertino, CA 95014) was purchased to enable student access to on-line lecture materials through the company’s secure web portal. The SBB Program Director prepared the iPad for the students to ensure the on-line links were usable. The Directors demonstrated the use of the iPad to the students for accessing educational content during the orientation week. Results NA-Educational Practice Abstract Conclusion The acquisition of iPads offered the flexibility needed by the students to access learner materials throughout their day where Wi-Fi is available (at work, home, café, etc.) without being dependent upon work or home computers. Further, use of the iPads has opened the opportunity to access assignments, download required texts where electronically available, and access the company learner management system for completing quizzes related to the student assignments.

Perceived Stress Level and Coping Mechanisms Among Health Allied Students

Purposes: This study identified and compared between the levels and types of stressors as well as coping behaviors. Design: Cross-Sectional Survey Methods: Data were collected using a convenience sample of 286 students Findings: The results showed that ‘‘teachers and nursing staff’ ’and ‘‘assignments and workload’’ were the highest sources of stress among nursing and MLS students. But this was much higher among nursing students. In addition, lack of professional knowledge and skills were cited the least stressors among both students’ groups. Practice Implications: The result can be used to support Nursing student to utilize positive coping mechanism to deal with stress successfully. Enhance academic staff awareness about re-allocation of the academic demands and the emphasis on the benefit of orientation week for the students.

Phishing risks in a university student community

In an exploratory quasi-experimental study, 138 students recruited during a university orientation week were exposed to social engineering directives in the form of fake emails, or phishing, over several months in 2017. The study assessed the risks of cybercrime for students by observing their responses. Three types of scam emails were distributed that varied in the degree of individualisation: generic, tailored, and targeted or ‘spear’. The study explored the influence of scam type, cybercrime awareness, gender, IT competence and perceived internet safety on susceptibility to email scams. Although tailored and individually crafted email scams were more likely to induce engagement than generic scams, differences were not significant. Analysis of the variables showed that international students and first year students were deceived by significantly more scams than domestic students and later year students.

Early exposure to community service learning in the medical curriculum: A model for orientation week introduction

Community service learning programs in pre-clerkship medical education are increasingly recognized as important in creating physicians who recognize the effects of one’s environment on their health and further strive to advocate for these patients to receive access to social programs that can improve their outcomes. The University of Ottawa Aesculapian Society recognized that an excellent method for providing early exposure to service opportunities in one’s new community is through Orientation Weeks. Prior to this year, no Orientation Week across Ontario had a philanthropy focus. Philanthropy in most students’ eyes refers to monetary donation. Understandably, Orientation Week directors continuously make the decision that asking medical students to donate money during the first week of one of many financially demanding yeas is unrealistic. Ottawa decided to incorporate philanthropy into our Orientation Week in the more inclusive form of community service, allowing students to donate their time, rather than donating their money. In addition to ensuring that philanthropy still has the opportunity to be a fundamental component of bonding during Medical School Orientation Weeks, as it does at the Undergraduate degree level, our initiative also served to facilitate early exposure to the various organizations students could complete their community service learning placements with later in their first year. Here we present our model, uO-Serves (“uOttawa-Serves”) of an Orientation Week philanthropy initiative of time-based community service in hopes that other Medical Schools will consider implementing a similar initiative within their Orientation Weeks