Abstract
The coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic is reshaping human activities across the world. During the spring of 2020, lecture halls, seminar rooms and wet labs were abruptly emptied following international guidelines aiming to contain the virus. Research and education came to a full stop, and campuses looked like ghost cities.
The people enrolled in laboratory animal science (LAS) courses could no longer attend lectures or practical sessions. Since most activities have paused since spring, the question arose whether LAS course providers should simply postpone their courses until research activities resume, or whether alternative approaches could be implemented in the meantime.
Against this background, the FELASA Accreditation Board for Education and Training (E&T Board) decided to get in touch with its course provider community in order to learn more about the specific situations they were facing, and to find out whether assistance could be given in these challenging times. Our first virtual (of course!) meeting with the FELASA accredited course providers was organised on 20 April 2020. The format of the meeting was informal, and drop-ins were welcomed. This first meeting received a lot of positive feedback, and a second meeting was organised on 28 May. Future meetings are planned.
With this communication, the E&T Board would like to share its experience. Popular wisdom says that necessity is the mother of invention, and this was clearly applicable to the question of replacing face-to-face lectures by distance-learning tools for LAS education and training.
1. Lectures
There was a consensus that it was necessary to keep courses alive to avoid a bottleneck in LAS education and training needs when research restarts. Several course organisers switched to distance learning. One course organiser generously offered full access to their e-learning platform for a given time to any FELASA-accredited course provider.
It was agreed that virtual meetings could be a way to discuss (e.g. ethical issues), interact (e.g. flipped classroom) and even assess (e.g. group work on a project/licence application) certain topics by LAS students (specifically ‘EU Module 2 or 9’), as well as providing and sharing of documents, and the use of ‘chat’ or instant messaging. For this to be a good solution, course organisers should pay attention to the fact that students could face technical problems or may have issues related to IT infrastructure.
2. Practical skills
The question of how to organise the practical sessions was central to the discussion. The first option was to postpone the practical sessions until the pandemic is over or when we know how to handle it. The second option was to set up practical sessions with a very restricted number of people and well-implemented safety rules. Stringent personal protection equipment and optimal disinfection procedures were considered to be safe enough but would be subject to specific regulations at course organisers’ ‘facilities’. The number of square metres per person varies between countries, but wet lab sessions in the usual format are no longer allowed. Thus, each course provider should adapt to the local guidelines. The main consequence is that trainers need much more time to deliver practical sessions. In order to make optimal use of the practical sessions, it was suggested to offer video demonstrations and videoconference to prepare for subsequent practical training.
An interesting discussion arose on how distance learning could be applicable to skills training and assessment, fully outsourced from the course usual location. The conclusion was that it could be applicable for simple skills not involving live animals (e.g. suturing). However, the discussion should continue to develop ideas on how practicals can be delivered and tested remotely. A forum dedicated to veterinary skills and based in the UK was mentioned: https://www.clinicalskillsandsimulation.com.
To entertain a possible scenario of skills evaluation done remotely, we elaborate a very schematic scenario made of three steps:
Videos, slides, papers, etc. are provided to the participants in order to prepare for step 2. A training is set up at the home animal facility under supervision of an identified and validated tutor by the course organiser. The course organiser decides how the training is done; it is recommended to use the DOPS (Direct Observation of Procedural Skills) approach, and to define thresholds to reach step 3. The local expert, preferably different from the tutor, assesses the skills of the candidate face to face, and a designated assessor at the course organiser location remotely observes the online examination. Alternatively, and when allowed by the local authority, the assessor can evaluate face to face.
A few points need to be kept in mind. First, the skills to be evaluated should be of minimal invasiveness in order to avoid the risk of causing welfare problems to the animals. Second, the evaluation sheet of the examination should be archived at the course organiser location as usual. Third, the course organiser needs to make sure that the animal facility has all necessary authorisations to train local people using live animals. Finally, the skill training done at a place other than the usual course location and assessment made partially per remote means should be specified on the student’s certificate.
3. Written exams
The question of evaluation of written examination at distance was also discussed. Consensus was reached that the rules for online examinations issued by the institution were sufficient to validate the examination. If there was no institutional online examination in place, a precise description of the assessment procedure should be done and archived. The question of the identity – that is, who is tested behind the screen – can be an issue, also in combination with GDPR.
The FELASA accreditation scheme requests an annual report from all course providers. The E&T Board will be able to have a precise overview of what happened during 2020 and is hoping to report more thoroughly what the prevailing solutions were for LAS E&T during this period.
Clearly, the COVID-19 pandemic significantly increased a sense of community in many human activities. This was also the case for the FELASA-accredited course provider community – a community which spans over borders and includes not only European but also Indian and African colleagues. The E&T Board was very pleased with the discussions during these virtual meetings and thought it was valuable to share this experience with course providers outside of our community. The more people from the teaching community who are experiencing these problems around the table, the more issues identified, and the more ideas to solve problems. Do not wait – join us by adhering to the FELASA accreditation scheme. For more information, please go to http://www.felasa.eu/accreditation-board-for-education-training or contact the FELASA secretariat on
The FELASA Accreditation Board for Education and Training (for a full list of E&T Board members see bottom of page at http://www.felasa.eu/accreditation-board-for-education-training).