Responding to the need of postgraduate education for Planetary Health: Development of an online Master's Degree.

Planetary Health has emerged as a new approach to respond to the existential risks that the clime and global environmental crises pose to human societies. As stated by various stakeholders, the challenges involved in Planetary Health are of such magnitude that education must be at the forefront to obtain a meaningful response. Universities and higher education institutions have been specifically called to embed the concept of planetary stewardship in all curricula and train the next generation of researchers and change makers as a matter of urgency. As a response to this call, the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC), the Universitat Pompeu Fabra (UPF), and the Barcelona Institute for Global Health (ISGlobal) developed the first online and asynchronous Master in Science (MSc) in Planetary Health. The aim of the programme is to train a new generation of academics and professionals who understand the challenges of Planetary Health and have tools to tackle them. This article describes the development of the curriculum of this MSc, presents the main characteristics of the programme and discusses some of the challenges encountered in the development of the programme and its implementation. The design of this MSc was based on: the alignment of the programme with the principles for Planetary Health education with a focus on human health; a multi-, inter-, and trans-disciplinary approach; the urgency to respond to the Anthropocene challenges; and the commitment to the 2030 Agenda. The MSc was recognized as an official degree by the Agency for Quality of the Catalan University System, included in the European Quality Assurance Register for Higher Education, and the Spanish National Academic Coordination body in April 2021 and launched in October 2021. There are currently more than 50 students enrolled in the program coming from a broad range of disciplines and geographic locations. The information presented in this article and the discussion on challenges encountered in developing and implementing the programme can be useful for those working in the development of similar programs.

Practical and Ethical Solutions for Remote Applied Learning Experiences in Global Health.

Global health trainees rely on immersive experiences to apply their classroom knowledge in real-world settings. However, during the COVID-19 pandemic travel has come to a halt and short-term experiences are no longer available in their current form. As with didactic material, global health programs have an opportunity to innovate the delivery of applied learning, providing trainees with robust, mentored experiences that promote the acquisition of core global health competencies. We provide a series of practical solutions for remote applied learning including case-based learning, pathfinder pedagogy, virtual reality simulations, and twinning. We further describe the role of these approaches in addressing common criticisms of short-term experiences and their potential for creating new win-win dynamics between institutions and trainees.

Integrating Competency-Based Didactic and Experiential Global Health Learning for Dental Students: The Global Health Learning Helix Model.

The aim of this study was to evaluate the feasibility and preliminary outcomes of immersive integrated experiential and didactic courses in strengthening competency-based global health learning in dental education. To address global inequities in oral health and student interest in global health, the Harvard School of Dental Medicine introduced two global health courses in 2017-18. The first was a didactic course in the core predoctoral curriculum, and the second, in collaboration with the Inter-American Center for Global Health, was a five-day elective experiential learning course in rural Costa Rica. The experiential course was an extension of the didactic course. All 33 second-year dental students completed the didactic course, and three of those students completed the experiential course. A pre-post survey and a six-month follow-up survey on self-reported knowledge based on course learning objectives were administered. The experiential course students also completed journals and interviews for qualitative analysis. Thirty-two students completed the pre-post didactic course surveys, for a response rate of 94%. There was a 100% response rate on the pre-post didactic surveys by those students who participated in the experiential learning course. While the experiential learning group scored similarly to the class average before the didactic course, they had higher scores than the class averages both immediately after and at the six-month follow-up. All three students reported that the experiential learning course was "extremely effective" in building on what they learned in the didactic course. Qualitative analysis of the journals and interviews suggested enhanced learning from the combination of didactic and experiential methods. These preliminary results support the Global Health Learning Helix Model, a theoretical competency-based teaching model for ethical student global health engagement to better prepare the future generation in tackling oral health disparities both locally and worldwide.