(90) SPEECing of Scholarship: How Working as an Experiential Consortium Maximizes Scholarly Productivity

Objective : The Accreditation Council for Pharmacy Education Standards 2016 encourages colleges/schools of pharmacy to require and promote scholarship. Despite being an expectation, scholarship can be challenging to prioritize while maintaining teaching, outreach, and service responsibilities. Collaborative research can help off-set the challenges and lead to greater productivity. Additionally, multi-institutional work is generally well-received at the peer review level. The aim is to quantify the scholarly output of an experiential education (EE) consortium.

Methods: The Southeastern Pharmacy Experiential Education Consortium (SPEEC) was established in 2002 and comprises the six accredited colleges/schools of pharmacy in Alabama and Georgia. SPEEC’s mission is to promote the advancement of EE through synchronizing procedures, providing preceptor training, and participating in scholarly activities. SPEEC meets regularly to collaborate on EE-related initiatives, including curricular revisions, quality assurance processes, and preceptor development. Workgroups leverage availability/expertise of SPEEC members and rotate lead roles, which assists members in achieving scholarship-related promotion criteria. Institution involvement varies on each project; regardless, collaboration leads to larger datasets which elevate scholarship’s generalizability and statistical significance.

Results: Since its inception, SPEEC has produced the following scholarly products: 11 peer-reviewed manuscripts, 14 national poster presentations, 8 national platform presentations, 1 grant, and multiple site/state/regional speaking opportunities. Most recently, SPEEC’s scholarship has centered around the integration of Entrustable Professional Activities within the EE curriculum, part of which is being supported by an American Association of Colleges of Pharmacy Scholarship of Teaching and Learning Grant.

Conclusions: Working as a consortium allows EE faculty and staff to maximize scholarly activity, fulfilling institutional expectations. Collaborative work expands resources across a larger group, aids in bolstering scholarship portfolios of individuals, and leads to more robust scholarship.