A GOC Council meeting held on July 10 provided attendees with an update on the Education Strategic Review (ESR), which has been extensively discussed and developed over the past couple of years.
Dr Subo Shanmuganathan, GOC’s interim director of education, started the discussion by summarising why the GOC launched the ESR. She explained that as people are living longer, they are more at risk of developing sight problems, particularly due to the increase in screen use. The GOC has also recognised that as there has been a shift from a science-based optometry degree to a more clinical one, it is necessary to update and evolve education standards. It also wants to look towards the workforce of both the present and the future to ensure the care offered to the public is of a high standard.
During the last GOC Council meeting in May, Council members offered recommendations on the key issues raised by the consultation. These were: to implement the one accountable provider approach; to create a standardised assessment framework; to develop learning outcomes and education standards that increase the clinical content of courses and the emphasis on professionalism and clinical leadership; and to support mentoring schemes for newly qualified professionals and to take forward work to support such schemes alongside an exploration of other options for support through the already established Transition to Practice project under the CET Review Programme.
Stakeholder workshops
Workshops were organised with more than 100 stakeholders in order to further discuss the issues and to gain an insight into the stakeholders’ views. During the workshops, the recommendation of implementing a ‘one accountable provider’ approach resulted in a significant debate. Some providers felt that a one accountable provider would not actually improve regulation of the education standards. However, according to the GOC’s ESR update report, ‘the majority of stakeholders agreed with this more accountable approach, stating that it would be more in line with other healthcare professional pathways and regulation, would improve student experience and would not prohibit different models of education and training.’
The report also said: ‘The barriers for providers were focused on the contracts required, should they decide to subcontract, and the logistical barriers to organising quality assurance of placements if they choose to manage this in-house.’
The GOC reported back that overall, the stakeholder workshops provided ‘extremely valuable feedback and were instrumental in the development of the recommendations that were presented to Council.’
The Council members reviewed the recommendations, developed in response to the ESR consultation on draft Education Standards for providers and learning outcomes for students, and made the decision to approve them all.
Council member Scott Mackie wholeheartedly agreed with the recommendations and said: ‘There are a lot of gaps in undergraduate education currently. I believe that mentoring should be mandatory like reflective learning is in Scotland because there are more and more high level risks regarding sight loss with patients.’
Gareth Hadley, GOC chair, added: ‘We should be more assertive in putting forward the idea that mentoring schemes are an important part of the learning journey of students.’
Dr Subo Shanmuganathan
Dr Shanmuganathan thanked all of the stakeholders that attended the recent workshops for ‘their commitment and constructive engagement.’ She said: ‘Our overarching goal is to develop a system of optical education that prepares practitioners for the roles of the future and ensures they can meet the changing needs of patients while maintaining public safety. We acknowledge the feedback we’ve received and accept that we need to do further work to shape the learning outcomes to ensure they are fit for the future. We intend to do this through two expert advisory groups, one for optometrists and one for dispensing opticians. We also understand the importance of developing an implementation plan that is realistic for all of our stakeholders. We have undertaken wide ranging stakeholder engagement throughout this review, and will continue to do so as we develop the final standards and outcomes and the timeframes for implementation.’
She also highlighted the fact that the ESR is an ongoing discussion and that it is keen to get the learning outcomes right, as 71% of ESR respondents did not completely agree with the proposed ones. Through further discussions, the GOC will keep on ‘co-creating solutions and feasible and viable timeframes for the steers with stakeholders.’
Dr Shanmuganathan added: ‘We want a good learning journey for all students and a more integrated programme of theory and practical knowledge seems to be desired,’ with students potentially undertaking more clinical work throughout their undergraduate degrees. However, this raised the question of whether clinical placements similar to those undertaken in the pre-reg year would work, as ‘students would be thrown into the deep end somewhat.’
Lesley Longstone, GOC’s chief executive and registrar, said in response to this: ‘Different clinical placements could be looked at if this were to go ahead. We would need to work with opticians’ practices on this, as they know what skills are needed to keep their businesses going.’
The GOC stated that it will publish the final ESR education standards and learning outcomes consultation response report in due course. In preparation for the November council meeting, it will set out a short, medium and long term implementation plan for each recommendation.
New courses
The Council has granted provisional approval for a new programme that will provide two registrable qualifications in optometry and in ophthalmic dispensing at the University of Central Lancashire and a new therapeutic prescribing programme at the University of Hertfordshire.
It also granted provisional approval to the University of Huddersfield’s new optometry programme, but this is subject to the registrar being content with additional mitigating actions, which may include writing to the vice chancellor of the university. The GOC explained that provisional approval means that ‘the provider has been approved by the GOC to run a programme which is considered as all or part of a route to registration. Students recruited to the programme are not guaranteed entry to the GOC register and may be required to undertake additional assessment through an alternative approved provider in the event that any aspect of the programme when delivered does not satisfy our requirements.’
Additionally, the Council has granted full approval to the Uni-versity of Hertfordshire’s Master of Optometry programme, four years after the first cohort of students started on the university’s optometry undergraduate degree.
