Transforming the Student Education Digital Experience in the Midst of Uncertainty

For the past year, the NYU Grossman School of Medicine has been in the midst of a digital transformation. The Institute of Medical Education developed a clear vision for our future of medical schooling and was steadily building a strong foundation of digital tools to better train our students. When the COVID-19 pandemic arrived and disrupted not only the healthcare system, but also the academic world, we were forced to accelerate the transformation process.

To decrease the spread of the virus among our students, our school made the transition from in-person teaching to fully-remote learning in March 2020. We were able to swiftly transition to an online education model because of the strong foundation of digital learning already established for our students. Our rapid response to the pandemic showed us how timely our investment in technology was, and helped to guide our priorities moving forward.

Digital Experience, A New Leading Concept

Creating a seamless experience with technology for patients, researchers, clinicians, staff and students at NYU Langone Health has long been an institutional strategy and priority. Seeing patients benefit from the increased use of technology in their care, through offerings like virtual visits and secure online communication with physicians, inspired our leadership to take a similar approach to the educational process.

In February 2020, the Institute for Innovations in Medical Education (IIME) initiated the student Education Digital Experience (EDX) program. For this undertaking, we partnered with our faculty, the Offices of Medical Education, Student Affairs, Graduate Medical Education, Admissions, and Diversity, as well as the Health Sciences Library, NYSIM, Learner Advisory Committee, and NYU Langone’s information technology department. In creating a formal EDX program, we aimed to:

· Improve educational outcomes through greater use of novel effective educational technologies and an improved user experience

· Improve faculty experience and outcomes

· Create a comprehensive learning portfolio

· Develop a continuously-learning medical education system

Brightspace, A Single Platform For All Learning Experience

Our initial research revealed that our students were finding it difficult to navigate numerous learning applications, tools, and resources that were dispersed across many different locations. They expressed that they were prone to getting “lost with too many ways of getting information,” signaling to us that there was a substantial need for a single platform facilitating access to all education-related resources. This need became even more critical during the pandemic, as in-person classes were replaced with remote sessions and digital tools were the primary touchpoint for our students to connect to their learning.

To respond to those demands, we quickly leveraged Brightspace, our Learning Management System, and transformed it into an interactive, contextualized, and personalized home for all of the medical school’s educational resources. Like the NYU Langone Health App for patients, the new Brightspace helps students better discover and access their learning resources, apps, and tools all in one centralized location. The landing page also provides us with analytics on usage to help working groups make informed, data-driven decisions about which tools and apps need to be improved. Using analytics, the app also automatically updates the display of widgets from the most to least used by learners.

Digital Learning for Novel Teaching

To optimize students’ learning experience, we also introduced new ways of digitally learning medical knowledge and skills. This includes 3D plastination models and Mozilla hubs for teaching anatomy in a 3D virtual world. We also introduced Caseen, a virtual case-based game that teaches construction of a tiered differential diagnosis, clinical reasoning and value-based medicine. Students also had access to Anki, an online tool used to create flashcards for pharmacology. These digital tools allowed students to diversify and personalize their learning and receive instant feedback from the apps, to see if they were meeting their educational goals. Our faculty combined these new tools with active learning methods such as flipped classrooms and mastery learning.

Improved Digital Experience, Improved Outcomes

The results of our EDX program have been phenomenal so far. The data has shown increased or stable medical knowledge scores from our pre-clerkship students and increased teaching evaluation scores for both pre-clerkship and clerkship courses. Students and staff also appreciate the new integrated Brightspace experience. In a recent survey comparing the old and the new app, 100 percent of respondents said the new Brightspace helped them to navigate and find better educational resources at NYU Grossman School of Medicine.

Holistic, Continuous and Collaborative Efforts

We have experienced great success with our EDX program thus far, due in large part to our commitment to user-centric design. Because we worked with our students to understand their needs, and continually solicited their feedback on how our programs were working, we were able to create experiences that truly benefited them. The analytics we collected on app usage were also crucial in allowing us to adapt our products along the way and gave us great insights into how we can improve in the future.

However, we accept that EDX is an ongoing concept rather than a single, time-bound project. We have learned that it was important to streamline the digital experience by providing an integrated experience, delete redundancies, and introduce needs-based education technology. We also learned that our collective efforts with key partners — faculty, medical education staff, students and colleagues in the information technology department — must continue.

An Education Digital Experience allows us to better engage with our students in their learning process, and help them to become the best doctors they can be. We will continue to innovate in the area of digital education and by doing so, maintain NYU Grossman School of Medicine’s status as a leader in medical education.

• So-Young Oh, MS MA: Assistant Director, Program for Digital Learning at Institute for Innovations in Medical Education (IIME), NYU Grossman School of Medicine, NYU Langone Health
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