Background
Innovative, dynamic medical programme
The Graduate Entry Medical School (GEMS) at the University of Limerick, Ireland is an innovative, dynamic programme. Students move around multiple campuses, hospital and general practice locations, with much of the teaching being provided by professional physicians and surgeons.
Challenge
Frequent, short notice class re-scheduling
The clinicians’ schedules sometimes changed due to last minute emergencies; classes were delayed or postponed; causing an administration headache for college staff and students. Classes needed to be re-scheduled and it was difficult to find a time that suited everyone, and facilities needed to be re-booked. As the standard university scheduling system could not accommodate such frequent changes email and excel spreadsheets were used. This system was becoming unreliable as student numbers increased; errors were common and both clinicians and students were getting frustrated.
Solution
Custom, online notification and scheduling system
ActionPoint identified GEMS needs and planned, designed and built a custom, online notification and scheduling system. All existing data was pulled in and various rules applied; the system stood independent of the university’s main system and removed the need for manual data entry and storage techniques. Any change in a schedule now resulted in an automatic notification going to students via text and email.
Result
Administration headaches reduced. Staff and students better served
The administrators estimate that the new system has probably cut the time they were spending on notifications and scheduling by 80%. Both clinicians and students are better served and facilities are being used more efficiently as changes are immediately notified to all. GEMS now have a notification and scheduling system built for their unique needs, fully tested, easy to maintain and ready to scale as required.
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