Annual Report 2008 - 2009 - Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine

EDUCATION &
TRAINING
LSTM’s education and training activities are
diverse and wide-ranging. As the following
pages show, 2008/09 has seen us embarking
on a variety of exciting new projects as well
as continuing to grow and develop our
established programmes. A suite of MSc
programmes continues to attract highlymotivated
graduates from around the world.
A distinctive feature of our MSc programmes
is the opportunity to carry out a dissertation
project overseas. This year we sent students to
over 30 countries worldwide, including some in
very challenging social and political contexts,
as shown by the account below of dissertations
conducted by students studying on the MSc in
International Public Health.
LSTM also runs professional Diploma and
short courses varying in length from 1 day
to 3 months, which provide participants
with the opportunity for intensive study
within a specialist field related to health care
in the tropics. This year saw the successful
introduction of a new Diploma in International
Community Health Care, which is targeted
at health professionals who are working or
planning to work in community health settings
in resource-poor countries. The programme is
distinguished by a move away from teacher-led
didactic lecturing towards a focus on studentcentred,
interactive learning, a philosophy that
we intend to embed in all LSTM programmes
over the coming years.
We have not just been busy in Liverpool but
have also extended our activities overseas,
including a pilot project in Ghana aimed at
building capacity in educational skills of local
tutors; provision of MSc teaching in the Syria
and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia; and the first
‘in-country’ delivery of our successful Diploma
in Humanitarian Assistance, which ran in South
Africa. All of these activities, both in Liverpool
and overseas, are underpinned by the sterling
work of our Student Registry, which supports
our students from application to graduation and
helps academic staff to deliver an education
and training experience of the high quality.
Selected Dissertations from
the MSc in International Public
Health (MIPH)
Key to our MIPH and MHS programmes are
approaches that encourage the transfer of
theory into practice through experiential
learning, reflection and action. These
Research meeting – Dr Olusegun and colleagues
in the conference hall of the Jigawa state ministry
of health.
approaches develop students’ skills in critical
thinking and enable exchange of ideas and
experiences between students from different
professional backgrounds and diverse country
contexts. Our unique client-led dissertation
option is an example of this approach. A
client identifies a research topic or problem
for further research, rather than the student
pursuing a research area based on their, or their
supervisor’s, interests and contacts. Most of
our clients are based in resource-poor settings
and include ministries of health, international
or national Non Governmental Organisations
(NGOs) providing services, and research and
DR SUE ASSINDER BSc PhD
DIRECTOR OF EDUCATION
Sue is LSTM’s first Director of Education. She has extensive experience of quality assurance, quality
enhancement, curriculum development and programme validation. Outside of conventional
teaching and learning, she has pursued an interest in promoting public engagement with
science. Sue has research interests in the pedagogy of learning and teaching, in particular the
development of effective student-led approaches to learning.
LSTM ANNUAL REPORT 31