Teaching Note—Adapting to Online Live Streamed OSCEs

ABSTRACT

This teaching note describes how a school of social work adapted Objective Structured Clinical Examinations (OSCE) during the COVID-19 pandemic to an online live-streamed format, providing students the opportunity to engage in this experiential learning activity despite pandemic-related limitations. A step-by-step process for developing online OSCEs is described, highlighting three key areas—planning, training, and implementation—and the significance of developing a community of practice. Reflections from our team on promising practices for conducting a live-stream OSCE, and insights from the perspectives of simulated clients (n=4), and experienced OSCE raters (n=6) are shared. Implications are described to support future teaching as educators are compelled to continuously prepare social work students for the online realities of practice beyond COVID-19.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Karen M. Sewell

Karen M. Sewell is an Assistant Professor at Carleton University’s School of Social Work.

Katherine Occhiuto

Katherine Occhiuto is a PhD Candidate at Carleton University’s School of Social Work.

Sarah Tarshis

Sarah Tarshis is a Post-doctoral Fellow at Carleton University’s School of Social Work.

Alicia Kalmanovich

Alicia Kalmanovich is a PhD Candidate at Carleton University’s School of Social Work.

Sarah Todd

Sarah Todd is the Director of the School of Social Work at Carleton University.