Self evaluation report

2.4. Target group to whom the programme is dedicated

The study programme will be opened for students with a bachelor in health care professions. Following bachelor will be accepted:

• 
  BA Nursing
  
• 
  BA Midwifery
  
• 
  BA Pedagogy for Nursing
  
• 
  BA Therapist
  
• 
  BA Speech Therapy
  

2.5. The Orientation of study program towards the leading principles of institution

The Faculty of Medicine in Pristina is an academic unit of the University of Prishina – engaged in teaching and applied scientific research in the academic disciplines of Medicinal and health profession fields.

Students should develop their professional orientation in ways where priority should be given to simple and direct methods of application of information based on scientific thought, by also stimulating orientation towards the creation of capacities for lifelong learning -continued education.

The trend in the University of Pristina and Faculty of Medicine is the gradual transition from teacher-centered methods to student-centered methods. The reformation of the teaching system required attention to educational premises in order to affirm the new teaching methodologies and at the same time ground itself on the empirical experience of teaching and learning.

The education and learning of health professions implies the offering of a scientific, human and ethical dimension, with continued advancement of professional goals in diagnosis curing and prevention of disease.

The Faculty of Medicine and students engage in continued cooperation, with the goal of building a community which: Educates students to become high quality doctors, dentists, nurses and pharmacists for the needs of patients and society; Enables the manifestation of student capabilities and critical thinking; Prepares students for lifelong learning; Introduces students to the latest medical technologies and systems; Enables the integration of basic sciences with clinical knowledge.

In the domain of postgraduate scientific studies of magistrate and doctoral-PhD level. The Faculty guarantees specific postgraduate programs in harmony with the interests of the students and the needs of society.

The new study programme is in line with the vision of the University and Faculty to educate well-prepared high professions. It serves the need of Teacher for professions in health care, which will be able to facilitate their work with a high-developed profession background in addition with teaching competencies. Regarding to the interest of students and the labour market, the Master program will fill a profession gap.

In line with the mission and vision, following teaching and learning methods will be offered and will develop teacher competencies at the University:

An approach of combining teaching and learning methods has been adopted, which enables students to identify and use their own experience, skills and knowledge to best advantage within the learning process. Therefore, the Master curriculum in Healthcare Management will be facilitated by the following main methods:

Lecture-based learning: An interactive discussion environment will be provided to explain theoretical issues of health sciences, management, legal, economic and organizational contexts. The classroom situation will also provide a supportive environment where students will be expected to receive feedback and learn from the experiences and knowledge of other students and tutors.

Problem Based Learning: Students will work in small groups to examine service user centred scenarios or case studies. The idea is that students work cooperatively as a team in order to achieve both subject based learning outcomes and transferable teamwork skills. This emphasizes self-directed learning supported by study guides where understanding is reinforced through its application in problem-oriented, task-based and work-related experience.

Simulation-based learning: Role-play with other students, as practitioners from public services or volunteer service users, is common practice within professional education. Simulation provides a relatively safe context in which students can practice skills and receive feedback in a way that would not be possible with real service users. More elaborate role-play exercises can also be used where students take on their professional roles engaging in a simulated case conference or a court session (for example).

Practice-based learning: The programme will provide opportunities for students to take responsibility for working in a healthcare setting as members of a team with supervision from mentors. During the field placement at the fourth semester students will learn about management patterns of healthcare settings, and be trained in using theory and concepts to both understand and critically reflect over the on-going practice. Tasks to observe and reflect over will be given by the teachers, and the students will give the teacher the learning outcome as small written reports.

Reflective learning: Encouraging students and teams to reflect / meta think on their activities and processes of working together, with a focus on service user care, can develop an understanding of one’s own role and values and those of other professions.

Research-based learning: students will get a deep knowledge of research methodology and will participate in research projects conducted by QEAP Heimerer. Students will work also on their diploma thesis in the fourth semester.

E-learning, Blended learning: For the program this however means monitoring the learning progress of students as well as support in initiation of self-defined learning processes. Learning is done in different levels of didactical methods, such as subject oriented learning, considering of subject-oriented approaches as well as intermediary didactic. Information system for Universities (IS4U) is based in the most modern technologies of Web 2.0 and it serves to help organize the learning process. Through IS4U will be enabled to accomplish lecturing, tests, publication of test results, course registering, application for tests, communication to all the participants in the lecture sending the information from the docent to all participants of a lecture etc.



Figure 5, Blended-learning system in the master programme