Creating Change Through Service and Experiential Faculty-led Learning Experiences

Colleagues at a university in the delta created a faculty-led fieldwork model that promotes interprofessional practice and education while providing a service to the community. Service and Experiential Learning Through Engagement in the Community (SELTEC) is a clinical model which allows students to engage in strategic partnerships within the community to provide free services to recipients of care while gaining experiential learning opportunities in both clinical and professional skills and abilities.

The SELTEC model gives students experiential opportunities to learn real-world contexts and develop skills of community engagement while affording community partners opportunities to address significant needs. The utilization of a faculty-led fieldwork model incorporates both service and experiential learning experiences providing a rich environment through which interprofessional skills can be modeled and assessed through interprofessional education.

Interprofessional education through utilization of the SELTEC model consists of
i) assisting the student in the knowledge of personal strengths and limitations,
ii) professional skills and communication, and iii) enhancing team and group dynamics.

Through SELTEC, students receive one-on-one feedback on professionalism and interprofessional interactions on a weekly basis and gain insight from faculty modeling of clinical and interprofessional skills. The SELTEC model allows students, the educational system, and the healthcare community to both provide service and receive benefit throughout the experience.

It is vital that healthcare professionals not only know and understand the role of one's discipline but also the role other healthcare team members have on the interprofessional team. Interprofessional skills are learned best through modeling and refined through direct, continuous feedback (Steinert, 2009). Knowledge and application of the SELTEC model in an allied health educational program allow for better care of clients during student fieldwork experiences, better service provided to our communities and better education for our students and future practitioners.