PBL- Good or bad?

[dburk91]

How was the PBL experience?! Worth while, beneficial, challenging? Overall how was it? The way to go or not? I am not sure if this is the right fit for me or not. In the little experience I've had with it (watching the first year students in my interview day and doing the moch PBL interview), it's hard to decide if it's the right fit for me! Did you like it or not?!

 

I appreciate anything!!!!

[jbuff]

I am a recent graduate from the SIU PA program. The PBL format is very challenging and it is not for everyone, but I thought it was a great way to learn how to assess, treat, and diagnose patients. The PBL format is very conducive to my personal learning style. You typically get a case every Monday to open and work through during the week. It helped me to process the information about the patient, the disease and differentials, what I was seeing with the lab values and diagnostics, as well as teaching me how and what I should be doing to treat the patient. I felt PBL really helped me when it came time to start clinicals (in this program you start going to a clinic once a week in your first year to gain experience before your rotations in year 2) because I had a good base understanding of how to approach a patient as well as a good foundation to help me interpret lab results and suggest treatment options. As I stated before, PBL is very challenging, but it is satisfying to know you are in charge of your own learning experience - you get out of PBL what you put into it, and for me that was my heart and soul because I really wanted to become an exceptional PA.

 

I wish you the best of luck!

[dburk91]

Thank you very much! When you say it is not for everyone, do you mean that some students do poorly with PBL or fail out? Or do those people get used to it over time and adjust?

I enjoyed the interview and enjoyed watching the first years in their PBL groups, and the mock PBL session we did was cool, but the limited amount of exposure to PBL that I had is still not enough for me to full decide whether the full PBL curriculum is for me or not.

[jbuff]

I meant that PBL is very different from traditional lecture based programs, so for some students it was difficult in the beginning of the program. Those students learned how to adjust to PBL over time.