Students’ Descriptions of their Collective Co-Curricular Learning Mapped to Outcomes

Objective. The objectives of this study were to examine pharmacy student organization representatives’ (SRs’) descriptions of their members’ collective co-curricular learning and to map these descriptions to ACPE Standards 2016 and the institution’s curricular outcomes. Methods. Data were collected at a single college of pharmacy during 2017-18 by requiring SRs in professional organizations to complete a 16-item questionnaire on behalf of their members about each co-curricular activity their organization completed. Descriptive statistics were used to characterize the questionnaire results. Content analysis was conducted on open-ended questions, and resulting codes were mapped to ACPE Standards 2016 and curricular outcomes. Results. The majority (74%) of the 152 unique co-curricular activities reported were designated as community outreach events, and an average (SD) of 15 (43) student members participated in each activity. The most frequently selected domain by SRs was “promoted professionalism” for 86% of activities. Upon distilling SRs’ open-ended responses regarding their learning, each response was assigned to one or more of 34 codes, and the most frequently assigned codes to learning descriptions were for patient education and counseling (36%). Conclusion. The results indicate that SRs can characterize their co-curricular activities as opportunities for learning. The results from the content analysis align with the quantitative data collected. Co-curricular activities provide opportunities for students to enhance their skills, knowledge and attitudes in both pharmacy practice and personal areas, which map to ACPE Standards 2016 and the College’s own curricular outcomes.