The self-instructional materials project: progress and prospects

Faculty members in the Health Sciences Consortium have developed replicable, exportable units of instruction under the direction of the Self-Instructional Materials Project. The project distributes currently 350 packages and lists 570 in it's Directory of Self-Instructional Materials. Published evaluation studies indicate improvement on national board exams with greater efficiency and savings in time when compared with other forms of instruction. One study shows similarity of results with students who use the materials in hospitals away from the university. Four basic activities are necessary to initiate and enlarge the collection of units available on each campus: training, production, tryout/revision and sharing. Analysis of trends for each set of activities is projected over a five-year period. As training activities decline, greater emphasis is placed on quality control and procedures for sharing materials that are under development.