The Solution

Partnering with Osmosis to support ATSU’s evidence-based educational model. 

Dr. Wendel knew he’d found a partner when he first saw Osmosis’ platform. The fact that it was built on the same learning science principles that he’d seen work before was simply icing on the cake. 

With over 3.2 million learners around the world using Osmosis, it was clear to Dr. Wendel that creating an active learning environment at ATSU had to involve Osmosis’ platform.

Supporting faculty with visual, active-learning resources easily aligned with their curricula.

Instead of burdening faculty with creating their own active learning resources and trying to align the right information to existing courses, Dr. Wendel gave them the gift of Osmosis: More than 1,800 videos aligned with tens of thousands of flashcards and board-style assessment items to support learning, application, and knowledge retention.

Dr. Wendel explains his thinking, “Let’s create the curriculum, but let’s not recreate what already exists. Let’s use Osmosis.” Faculty were receptive to an engaging, visual resource for their students that looks unlike anything else on the market. “Everything else we tried before Osmosis either was somebody lecturing on a screen, which was no better than a faculty member doing it, or it wasn’t packed right. It wasn’t focused on the type of discipline I was trying to create.”

Osmosis’ comprehensive platform checked all the boxes: it includes solutions for osteopathic medicine, physician assistants, nursing, and other health professions. What’s more, each video is the perfect length for students to learn chunks of content quickly, without becoming overwhelmed by too much information at once.

Because Osmosis’ content library is organized for each medical specialty, it was simple for Dr. Wendel’s team to incorporate into ATSU’s curriculum, program by program. And, says Dr. Wendel, “Osmosis came in with short, hard-hitting videos that I could integrate into a curriculum, so we don’t have to recreate something that already exists.” 

“The way that Osmosis has been able to integrate learning and the use of Osmosis tools into existing curriculum is another thing. It doesn’t just sit out here on the side. It’s right there within what I have to learn. And I’m not doing a commercial for Osmosis — but I haven’t seen that anywhere else.” 

Improving learning outcomes with continuous, low-stakes assessment

Another part of the solution? Leveraging the “testing effect” by providing students with practice questions and opportunities to regularly engage in low-stakes learning assessments. As a longitudinal curricular support tool, Osmosis supports knowledge acquisition and retention across the curriculum, allowing students to watch a video and immediately apply that learning by answering board-style questions or flashcards. 

“The flashcards help students decide whether they know they’ve accomplished an objective. We’ve got this set of cards, or assessments, that they can use to test their knowledge.” says Dr. Wendel. “The other reality is that they do have to pass tests eventually here, board exams, and our own multiple choice curriculum. And the best way for students to be successful is to answer a lot of questions.”

The Challenge

Moving from a passive, lecture-based model to an active learning environment that puts students in control.

Dr. Wendel explains, “I realized a lot of the problems with traditional education, of sitting people in a room, was inefficiency. I could put a hundred people in a room and spout information at them, but it wasn’t the best way - especially in the health professions - because you started at eight in the morning and went until four o’clock in the afternoon. And people stop listening after the first 12 minutes. We knew we had to break this up a little bit, make students a more active participant in the education process, not a passive receptacle.”

ATSU recognized that engaging students in active learning gave them the best chance of success. They began to integrate learning science principles into their pedagogy - particularly focusing on the role of “chunking” content into smaller units - to help their students master the large volume of information they need to learn and apply to become successful clinicians.

As Dr. Wendel and his team began to break down subjects into smaller, more digestible, objectives, students became more engaged and their understanding and retention of complex subjects improved. And other faculty noticed. “More and more people were realizing that doing it in short, succinct punches was really effective and the students liked it,.” says Dr. Wendel, and he wanted to continue the move away from a lecture-reliant curriculum.

His next challenge? Finding a partner who could support faculty and students with chunked learning modules and integrate active learning resources into ATSU’s existing curriculum.

The Result

Students are taking advantage of the learning science behind Osmosis to retain more information in less time and recall that information when they need it most.

ATSU students quickly began sharing Osmosis videos with one another. When Dr. Wendel talks to students, they tell him they watch Osmosis videos rather than re-watching a lecture. “When I sit down and talk to students I always ask what resources they use the most. Osmosis is always the first thing they talk about, which empowers the students!”

Osmosis is now available system wide to 1,500+ students at eight programs. With an average of 5,500 videos watched and 1,386 multiple choice questions completed per month, Osmosis is used by nearly every student.

Beyond strong student usage, Dr. Wendel identified other measures of success, “Success for me is two things: One is that the students say it’s the best educational experience they’ve ever had. That’s my first goal. The other is that they continue to use a resource like Osmosis or other things beyond graduation. That second part of success is giving the students the ability to efficiently and effectively continue to learn.” With the addition of category 1 CME credits for watching Osmosis videos, lifelong learning with Osmosis is within grasp for ATSU graduates.

As for where medical education is headed, Dr. Wendel sees a bright future for students who are given the chance to leverage technology like Osmosis for active learning. “Eventually students are so ingrained in the use of technology that...they’re going to influence how faculty feel about education. And eventually those students will become faculty and things will change a lot faster when that happens.”