The impact of development schools to support educators in facilitating and leading person-centredness in healthcare curricula: A multiple methods study

Person-centred practice is the globally aspired standard of healthcare. It has an increasingly strong footprint in health care policy and practice but is less evident in education. This presentation will provide an overview of a three-year pan-European Erasmus+ Project focused on person-centredness in healthcare education including the development of a Person-centred Curriculum Framework (PCCF) (McCormack et al., 2022, O'Donnell et al. 2022; Cook et al. 2022). As part of the Erasmus+ programme of work, two innovative schools were developed, delivered and evaluated. The first 5-day school was delivered in May 2022 (n=42) and focused on developing educators as facilitators of person-centred curricula. The second school, for leaders who influence person-centred curricula (n=26), was delivered for five days during July 2022 and included four additional monthly half-days virtual workshops from September to November 2022. As this project involved partners from six universities across five countries, the Schools' evaluation was set within the principles of collaborative inquiry. Multiple methods were used to collect data including pre- and post-school questionnaires to measure respondents' self-reported understanding and confidence in facilitating / leading person-centred curricula. Qualitative data included records of participants' hopes, fears and expectations, reflective responses to critical questions and written daily evaluations. Participants from both schools were also invited to take part in an online, audio-recorded evaluative workshop in November 2022 to explore enablers and challenges in applying the PCCF and their views regarding the impact of the schools on their education practice. The findings revealed that the schools provided a unique opportunity to learn about, whilst simultaneously experiencing, a person-centre curriculum. Perspectives on facilitating / leading person-centred curricula were transformed with greater clarity on implementing the PCCF. Participants reported a cognitive shift from viewing curricula through a traditional lens, to one that envisions and achieves success through collaborative endeavour.