Led by the North Metropolitan TAFE, WA state colleges have been working collaboratively to design and develop digital work placement tools. The project involved metropolitan and regional colleges who designed and developed flexible, sustainable, consistent, evidenced based and compliant tools for use across health care facilities in WA.
A national first for enrolled nursing students, PebblePad was the chosen digital solution. The platform was evidence based, responsive and flexible to the needs of the VET sector, seamlessly adapting their service, while understanding the complexities of compliance and quality. Importantly, responsive training and digital help tools were developed to support all stakeholders.
The digital solution was well received by students who were at the heart of the project, most importantly providing certainty, digital access, and sustainability. The tool gives students a holistic view of the learning journey throughout each work placement, empowering them to be well prepared with a streamlined and easy to use tool. Students can reflect on their learning experiences and achievements, and plan for their future success across the entire learning journey.
The tool empowers educators to seamlessly integrate reflection, support, and compliant assessment into the digital tool, with flexibility to complete assessments online or offline, via a PC, tablet or mobile device, fitting well with the broad scope of the placements.
Sustainability was achieved through the replacement of large paper-based tools, secure digital record keeping, access to past work, reduced risk of damage and loss, and real time tracking of progress to identify students a risk and assessment compliance, for early intervention.
Ongoing evaluation of the project indicates satisfaction from industry, students, and assessors, where continuous improvement is timely and effective. Future plans involve expansion to simulation-based assessment tools and digital health records. Our success has generated interest across the nation with other TAFEs engaging with PebblePad.