Skills development by project-based education in the food and diet course of a pharmacy program
Written by: Y. Vander Heyden, D.L. Massart, E. Van Gyseghem, F. Questier, C. Vannecke, E. Deconinck • September 1 2007• Volume 7 - Issue 3•Abstract
Project-based education was introduced in the food and diet course of the Masters program in Pharmacy at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. The students were divided into groups, each dealing with two projects. One was related to general food science and one to diet products available in public pharmacies. For each project the students prepared a report, an oral presentation and a publication (such as a poster, flyer, article or website) oriented to a broad public. The tutor of each group supervised the activities and evaluated the students both individually and as a team. The students also evaluated their fellow group members. Moderate to high correlations were observed between the evaluations of tutors and students. Over the years it has been observed that the introduction of project-based education improves particular skills of students. Individual evaluation was somewhat problematic, but a suitable methodology was attempted.
