Kumpu Minna, Atkins Salla, Zwarenstein Merrick, Nkonki Lungiswa
Department of Public Health Sciences, Global Health (IHCAR), Karolinska Institutet, Stockholm, Sweden.
Centre for Studies in Family Medicine, Department of Family Medicine, Western University, London, Ontario, Canada.
Glob Health Action. 2016 Oct 6;9:28058. doi: 10.3402/gha.v9.28058. eCollection 2016.
Novel research training approaches are needed in global health, particularly in sub-Saharan African universities, to support strengthening of health systems and services. Blended learning (BL), combining face-to-face teaching with computer-based technologies, is also an accessible and flexible education method for teaching global health and related topics. When organised as inter-institutional collaboration, BL also has potential for sharing teaching resources. However, there is insufficient data on the costs of BL in higher education.
Our goal was to evaluate the total provider costs of BL in teaching health research methods in a three-university collaboration.
A retrospective evaluation was performed on a BL course on randomised controlled trials, which was led by Stellenbosch University (SU) in South Africa and joined by Swedish and Ugandan universities. For all three universities, the costs of the BL course were evaluated using activity-based costing with an ingredients approach. For SU, the costs of the same course delivered with a classroom learning (CL) approach were also estimated. The learning outcomes of both approaches were explored using course grades as an intermediate outcome measure.
In this contextually bound pilot evaluation, BL had substantially higher costs than the traditional CL approach in South Africa, even when average per-site or per-student costs were considered. Staff costs were the major cost driver in both approaches, but total staff costs were three times higher for the BL course at SU. This implies that inter-institutional BL can be more time consuming, for example, due to use of new technologies. Explorative findings indicated that there was little difference in students' learning outcomes.
The total provider costs of the inter-institutional BL course were higher than the CL course at SU. Long-term economic evaluations of BL with societal perspective are warranted before conclusions on full costs and consequences of BL in teaching global health topics can be made.
全球卫生领域需要新的研究培训方法，特别是在撒哈拉以南非洲地区的大学，以支持加强卫生系统和服务。混合式学习（BL）将面对面教学与基于计算机的技术相结合，也是一种教授全球卫生及相关主题的便捷且灵活的教育方法。当作为机构间合作组织时，混合式学习还有共享教学资源的潜力。然而，关于高等教育中混合式学习成本的数据不足。
我们的目标是评估在一个三所大学的合作项目中，混合式学习在教授卫生研究方法方面的总提供者成本。
对一门关于随机对照试验的混合式学习课程进行了回顾性评估，该课程由南非斯泰伦博斯大学（SU）牵头，瑞典和乌干达的大学参与。对于所有三所大学，使用基于活动的成本核算和成分法评估混合式学习课程的成本。对于斯泰伦博斯大学，还估算了采用课堂学习（CL）方法讲授同一课程的成本。使用课程成绩作为中间结果指标，探讨了两种方法的学习成果。
在这个与具体情境相关的试点评估中，即使考虑平均每个地点或每个学生的成本，混合式学习在南非的成本也比传统的课堂学习方法高得多。两种方法中，人员成本都是主要的成本驱动因素，但斯泰伦博斯大学混合式学习课程的总人员成本高出三倍。这意味着机构间的混合式学习可能更耗时，例如，由于使用了新技术。探索性结果表明，学生的学习成果差异不大。
机构间混合式学习课程的总提供者成本高于斯泰伦博斯大学的课堂学习课程。在就混合式学习在教授全球卫生主题方面的全部成本和后果得出结论之前，有必要从社会角度对混合式学习进行长期经济评估。
