UNMC online programs provide career development

UNMC offers several online programs that result in degrees or certificates. We met with three graduates of UNMC’s Master of Health Professions Teaching and Technology program to ask about their experiences in completing one of these programs, what they learned, and how it’s impacted their job performance since.

Why did you enroll in this UNMC online program?

• Abbey Fingeret, MD, associate professor of surgical oncology: I felt like I had a reasonable understanding of the basics of how to be an educator but was lacking the depth of how to be an educator in the 21st century. A lot of my training was projectors with transparency sheets. I wanted to be able to reach the learner in a modality that they could resonate with, but I didn’t have the skills. (After auditing a few classes), immediately I realized absolutely this is what I needed. This is what I was looking for.
• Vanessa Crookshank, associate professor of dental hygiene, Colorado Mountain College: I worked at Central Community College in Hastings, Nebraska, which is actually my alma mater, where I graduated dental hygiene school. I worked there four years as an educator. That’s an associate’s degree and to teach in dental hygiene you need a bachelor’s degree. At Wichita State University (where she completed her bachelor’s), I could transfer a lot of credits, which meant I needed to take some electives to be able to graduate. I took one called emerging educational technology, and it really just lit my fire for technology and education. I just started Googling and searching for my best fit, and that’s kind of where I found UNMC, and it’s perfect because, you know, I’m Nebraska born and raised.
• Leah Stade, OTD, assistant professor, academic fieldwork coordinator, occupational therapy, UNMC College of Allied Health Professions: I’ve done a lot of education in the clinical setting. You know, having fieldwork students, patient education, tons of that kind of stuff. But as far as education in the classroom, and particularly distance-based education, I just didn’t feel like I had a great grasp on it. And especially when it came to things like simulation and some of those, I would say, newer technologies. I felt like this program offered an opportunity to expand my knowledge in those areas and maybe help me have less imposter syndrome being a teacher in the classroom versus in the clinical environment.

What was it like to complete an online program during an already busy schedule?

• Dr. Fingeret: I took one or two classes a semester for a couple of years. It was effective and efficient for me because everything I was learning and working toward in the coursework I was applying to my professional life.
• Crookshank: I did more of an accelerated approach. I’m also the mother of a 3-year-old, so this is my second degree in, what, three and a half years? I was juggling a lot of things full time. Mom. Wife. Student. Employee. Yeah. The funny thing, I don’t know if many people have this experience with a second or graduate degree, but I had the most fun ever. Everything I was learning at UNMC, I was putting into practice in my work, and all the projects that we had helped me enhance stuff that I was already working on. So it wasn’t a chore.
• Dr. Stade: If it wasn’t for a couple of the peers that went through the program at the same time as me, I’m not sure that I would have kept doing it because we all were working full time and doing really hard things, and a few of us, we’re busy moms that were also juggling home stuff, too. And so that was really fun to have peers all over the country to learn from and learn with. And then just being able to do the work when it worked for me was nice. My kids joked often that my car became my office, and I did a lot of homework during soccer practice or in the parking lot between when I got off work and when the band concert started, or those kinds of things. And so, it was nice to have that capability, to be able to do the work where it fit into my already busy schedule.

How did it help you do your job better?

• Dr. Stade: I think it’s helped me do my job in a lot of ways. One, it helped me dream big and be more creative with the ways that I would do things. I would say I’ve used it a lot in the mentorship aspect, whether that’s with our practitioners, educator students or with our doctoral capstone students that we mentor. You know they’re planning their own learning experience. And, being able to work through the processes of planning a learning experience is very parallel to what we do as instructors when we plan a course and so that has really helped me become a better mentor for our OT students. Being able to critically evaluate my own teaching and to be able to ask myself those “why” questions is always invigorating as an instructor.
• Crookshank: Since it’s a new program, this is a brand-new dental hygiene program, we’re building it from the ground up, which is unique in itself. Not many people can say they’re doing that. But we’re new; we can’t just start with the old technology and the old ways. This is our opportunity to step it up and show why we’re such a new and innovative program. You know, dream big. But here I am doing it.
• Dr. Fingeret: So many of the things I worked on and ended up being my portfolio for my master’s program are things that I have since done and taught and have received incredibly positive feedback from the learners. In March of 2020, you may recall, we had to pull most of our learners out of the clinical environment due to COVID. And so, within two weeks, we had to transition from what was supposed to be a live, in-person experiential simulation-based course to a completely online distance learning course, and if I had not had the knowledge, the skills and the contacts that I had made through the HPTT program, that would have been impossible.