Students as Partners: How the Student-centred Active Learning Concept May Help Indian Pharmacy Education

Abstract:

The growing healthcare industry and the demand for a skilled workforce in India lead many students to enroll in medical and healthcare professional programmes. Pharmacy programmes in India prepare the students to deal with emerging opportunities in healthcare. Being a country with a great diversity of approaches, and the expectations of students from Generation Z, pharmacy education in India has an opportunity for rejuvenation to engage students in active learning. Educationalists and policymakers can explore to engage the current generation of students, who have a motivation to intervene with institutions and authorities. ‘Students as Partners’ is an emerging concept re-positions students as active partners to enrich students’ learning experiences. There are four areas of partnership within the ‘Students as Partners’ conceptual model; these are ‘Teaching and learning including assessment’, ‘Subject-based research and inquiry, ‘Scholarship of teaching and learning’, and ‘Curriculum design and pedagogic consultancy’. The perceptions and willingness of stakeholders toward student engagement through the partnership will be the key to the success of the ‘Students as Partners’ concept in India. To promote student-centered active learning in pharmacy programmes, institutions and academic staff can consider strategies to engage students in their learning process. This paper discusses how the students as partner concept can be implemented in the Indian Pharmacy education setting to enhance students’ learning experiences.

Keywords: Student engagement, Partnership, Pharmacy education, Active learning, Adult learning, Teaching and learning.