Online Medical Course Creation:
A path to “free” education?
By: Chase DiMarco
Every student wants to know what the “best” resources are, but that is not the proper question. You must find the resources that work FOR YOU. I found videos much more useful at the time, especially those with graphic representations. This is also part of the reason for the creation of the FreeMedEd website (FME): to consolidate resources under one “hub” for easy access via our Disciplines pages. I tried to vet and organize much of the material out there to save students time. Now, the focus is more on original content.
Coming from a Caribbean medical school, there are a few considerations that are unique to the planning and execution of your education. For instance, unless you want to pay several hundred dollars in extra airline baggage fees, bringing all of your required texts with you is probably not a great idea. And the school library cannot keep enough of every copy needed for every student. Some students opted to print out their pages, others use PDFs, and many looked for more captivating video-based materials. This is where the YouTube playlists can in for FME.
Cost-Benefit Analysis
It’s exceptionally easy to spend several hundred dollars per textbook, hundreds of dollars an hour with tutors and mentors, and thousands of dollars for online and video-based lecture series. With students already receiving ridiculously high tuition charges and interest rates, this seems almost criminal. And for students that decide this career path is ultimately not the right one for them, third-party study resources have now simply added – potentially significantly – to their debt.
I’m not saying the creation of such materials is not time and resource-intensive. And for certain materials, a fair price is absolutely justifiable. However, the highly inflated prices associated with medical resources is often put under the, “they will be able to pay off their debts when they become doctors” category. It’s also easy to charge excessively when the supply of resources is low, often due to greedy use of copyrights.
FreeMedEd gathers and creates materials in the Creative Commons and Public Domain to be used by all. Even our course presentations can be requested: saving hundreds of hours on content creation. Some more personalized material, like private sessions, can be arranged for a fee. However, there’s no reason for instructors to waste their time repeating the same boring lecture term after term. There is less reason for students to pay for such redundancies.
Growing Rapidly
Though FME began as a simple hobby and passion project in 2014, it did not really take off until the end of 2018. Since then, our first Intro to Medical Micro Courses has been released for free. You can also simply view the videos via our YouTube Channel if you don’t wish to register for the course. We’d love to hear feedback to improve on future content and see what types of courses are desired by the audience.
We also have a blog that covers a wide range of student-related materials, including IMG struggles, personal finance, mnemonics training, and how to handle the emotional roller coaster that is medical school. We are also working on a medical student study guide that is guaranteed to bring new and interesting methods for studying in medical school (or other higher education posts).
Most recently, our new podcast, the Medical Mnemonist Podcast, has climbed the medical podcast charts rapidly! I cover expert interviews from those in accelerated learning and memory training: bringing medical students a new skill set in which to approach their studies and excel. We have even joined up with the InsideTheBoards podcast to better coordinate study material and reach a wider audience with these free resources.
Looking to Join a Movement?
Though we have many different areas of interest, the original idea of creating innovative course content to students is still a primary goal. If you have ever thought about teaching, creating an online course, or would like to receive training to do so, please feel free to reach out to us on social media or via our Email. Even though NYU may have beat us to the punch for free medical education, the future is online courses.
Become a content creator, TA, social media guru, editor/fact-checker, or a host of other creative positions. We need you to bring this content to the masses. And hey, it looks great on a CV too!
Chase DiMarco is a graduate of St. James School of Medicine, PhD-candidate in Educational Psychology, and MHA student. His passion for learning how to learn began early in his studies and has led to the creation of various free educational resources, including online courses and a podcast. As the founder of FreeMedEd, one aim has always been to bring affordable educational resources to those in healthcare academia.
LifeofaMedStudent has no financial relationship with either Chase DiMarco or FreeMedEd.
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