Serious Shortage Of Trained Healthcare Professionals, Says Who Report

Do you wish to build a thriving career in the healthcare industry? But do you have the necessary skills and knowledge? With growing costs of college education, it is now becoming increasingly difficult for most young people to pursue undergraduate degrees, especially in health professional education. So what other academic options do you have?

The Smartest Solution

Online learning or eLearning is one of the best ways that can help you to develop the necessary skills required to become a healthcare professional. In fact, according to a new research, online education can enable millions of learners to pursue a career in the healthcare sector worldwide. The study, conducted by Imperial College London (ICL) and commissioned by the World Health Organisation (WHO), focused on analyzing the efficiency and value of online learning for undergraduate healthcare education.

Need For Healthcare Training

As per another recent report published by WHO there is a global shortage of almost 7.2 million healthcare professionals and the finding estimate that the number is set to rise further in future. The team of researchers at Imperial College London considered online education as a feasible solution to train more professionals as learners only require a reliable internet connection to pursue an undergraduate programme. Moreover, the course content can be accessed easily online as well as offline through USB flash drives and CD-ROM.

The findings, which were collected from over 108 studies, revealed that learners can develop the necessary knowledge and skills through online learning, both online and offline, in an affordable, convenient and flexible way. In fact, the study suggests that students can learn just as effectively as or even better than traditional learning methods.

Taking A Blended Approach

However, it was recommended that a mix of traditional education and online learning, similar to the blended learning approach, will prove to be the most advantageous solution for training aspiring healthcare professionals like doctors and nurses. Simply pursuing E-learning programmes might not prove to be as useful as trainees need to develop practical skills as well.

Dr. Josip Car of the School of Public Health at Imperial College London commented “E-learning programmes could potentially help address the shortage of healthcare workers by enabling greater access to education, especially in the developing world where the need for more health professionals is greatest.”

Expanding The Reach Of Education

He added that there are certainly many challenges which we need to overcome, like quick and easy access to computers, fast and reliable internet connections, offering high quality content and learning resources. Dr. Car requested universities and colleges to offer online programmes and other online resources on a wide scale so that students from around the globe can easily access them.

We hope that online education provides the necessary solution to train and teach aspiring healthcare workers on a global scale.

Article Source: bit.ly/1CIpsvr

Reducing Gap In Poor And Rich Students In Universities Across The UK

In the past few years, the number of poor and rich students applying for a university programme has reduced significantly with more and more underprivileged teens planning to enrol than ever before.

More “Poor” Students Applying To University

Recent data published by UCAS reveals that the application rates of students in the age of 18, who reside in poor communities in the 4 nations of the UK, has risen to the highest recorded levels. However, although the gap between wealthy aspiring students and their less affluent peers is narrowing, the rich kids still are twice as more likely to enrol. The gap between male and female learners aspiring to pursue a degree is increasing as well. Overall around 100,000 more female students have applied to study a university programme than men this year. It has been observed that now 36 per cent of young women are more likely to apply than their male counterparts.

Mary Curnock Cook, chief of UCAS, had earlier notified that a “disquieting” gap exists between women and men applying for university. This has been increasing since the early 1990s and further worsened. The recent figures show that the numbers of individuals in the United Kingdom and other countries who submitted their applications by the closing date of 15th January 2015.

Growing Demand For University Degree

In general, a 2 per cent increase in applications was observed, as compared to the previous year with more than 592,290 students applying. A 1 per cent increase was seen among the applicants from UK, according to UCAS. Moreover in England, the number of students applying for university also rose by 1 per cent. Cook of UCAS believes that the growing demand for university seats will keep on increasing. However, she thinks that the rate of growth has somewhat reduced this year. She said “Demand for UK higher education, notably from younger people and from EU countries, has continued to rise in 2015. It is heartening to see the gap between rich and poor continue to narrow. Nevertheless, demand has grown more slowly this year and has fallen for mature students. This perhaps reflects improved employment prospects in the UK.”

An analysis of the data reveals that almost 21 per cent of disadvantaged students in England, who are 18 years old, applied for university in 2015, with 3 per cent in this group more likely to apply than last year. UCAS commented “Differences in application rates between advantaged and disadvantaged areas have reduced over the past decade, reduced further in 2015 and were at the lowest level recorded.”

Narrowing The Gap

The fact is now the wealthiest 18 year old students in the United Kingdom are 2.4 times higher probability of aspiring to attend university than the most underprivileged ones. Back in 2006, these students were 3.7 times more likely to send an application. Chairman of Social Mobility Charity at the Sutton Trust, Sir Peter Lampl, said “The continuing growth in disadvantaged applicants is welcome, and will narrow the access gap. Nevertheless, there is still a significant gap, particularly to the most selective universities, and a worrying dip this year in mature applicants.”

He added “There were many who said the reform of student finance would discourage young people from going to university. The opposite has occurred; numbers have grown, in particular those from disadvantaged backgrounds. Our reforms now also mean universities are well funded for the future. At the same time, we have expanded vocational training, particularly apprenticeships, which have reached two million. This is a record to be celebrated.”