Do the name ” Enhet for læring” or ”Unit for learning” sound familiar to you? Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry has , in collaboration with Haukeland University Hospital, employed an educationalist to strengthen the medical teaching competence. How this can help us in our teaching, you will get to know at the Teaching Day 2016 on 12 October.

We will arrange the Teaching Day together with K1, and this time as a full day seminar rather than two half days, like we did last year. The new curriculum Medisin 2015 has now been in effect for one year. During the meeting we will have an actual demonstration of Team Based Learning as performed during autumn term. This as an inspiration of how we may incorporate this technique in our teaching (even without having to refurnish the auditoriums).

Digital presentation; making a presentation where you as a teacher may show pre-recorded combined pictures and sound is now a valid option. This may be short presentations for the students to go through before a ”regular” lecture in the auditorium or as a full recorded plenary lecture as an alternative for individual students to physical attend. The program used for this purpose is named TechSmith Relay (additional information available at relay.uninett.no). During the Teaching Day we will show examples and practical tips on how to use this system.

Faculty of Medicine and Dentistry at the University of Bergen has entered a collaboration with NTNU and UiT with the aim of strengthening the examination process by developing a huge common database of MCQs (Multiple Choice Questions) for the Medical Curriculum. This to ensure examination uniformity throughout the different Faculties in Norway and give UiB the possibility to use MCQs developed in the other faculties. MCQ may well be used with a short clinical introduction (case description) followed by different questions regarding diagnose and treatment as well as basic knowledge (anatomy and physiology). To be able to develop GOOD MCQs we will build upon the experience from those in NTNU that have used this very structured during several years. We aim for all teachers being able to develop MCQs from their specific fields of expertise. This will ease the work of putting together an individual exam and the marking process will be automatic and less subjective!

Remember to set aside the 12th of October in your appointment schedule. Warmly welcome!

Jone

The relationship between jobs funded by the anuum (the basic budget from the government) and those covered through external funding, and the relationship between technical-administrative and academic positions always awakens interest. Some believe that the number of administrative positions at K2 increases at the expense of scientific positions. In short, that there is too much administration and too little science. Recent figures that illustrate these conditions are now available for the period 2013 to 2016.

Figure 1 shows number of K2 administrative, technical and academic positions funded through the anuum in the specified period. There has been a decline in number of academic positions (from 60.7 in 2013 to 52.8 in 2016), a slight reduction in number of administrative positions (from 14.5 to 12.5) and no change in number of technical positions (2013: 36.4 and 2016: 36.3). The ratio of scientific to administrative positions was 4.2 in both 2013 and 2016.

The picture becomes a little different when we include the externally funded positions (Figure 2). There has been a marked increase in number of academic positions salaried externally, while administrative positions with this kind of funding has remained virtually unchanged. The two ways of financing combined are visualized in Figure 3. The conclusion is that the relationship between number of scientific and administrative positions is moving in the right direction. This development (Figure 3) is deliberate and intentional, but it cannot continue like this uninterrupted. There is a need to strengthen the economy section, and a new economy consultant starts at K2 over the summer. We will also employ a research consultant to strengthen applications for external funding.

Per