The new Diabetes at School eLearning program developed by Healthily in collaboration with Diabetes Victoria (lead agency), the Royal Children’s and Monash Children’s hospitals has been rated as “Excellent” in an online survey conducted by Diabetes Victoria.
Launched last September by the Victorian Minister for Education, the Hon. James Merlino MP the program is designed to build the knowledge, skills and confidence of teachers (and parents) supporting students with Type 1 diabetes. The engaging program includes information on how to support students and real life stories from students, their parents and school staff.
With close to 2,500 Victorian students estimated to be affected by type 1 diabetes, the Diabetes at School program is helping help principals, teachers and other school staff build awareness of type 1 diabetes and confidence to support students in their care, particularly how to recognise and safely respond in the event of an emergency.
The program has been completed by more than 2,000 school staff and parents and has received excellent feedback, engagement scores, and online survey results.
Over 240 participants have completed the survey to date. Current results include:
- Overall value of the program: Highly valuable
- Increased my knowledge of type 1 diabetes: Strongly agree
- Increased my understanding about the needs of students with type 1 diabetes: Strongly agree
- Increased my confidence to support students with Type 1 diabetes: Strongly agree
- Usefulness of additional resources provided in the program: Extremely useful
- How likely are you to recommend the Diabetes at School online program to a teacher, school staff, parent or carer?: Extremely likely
The interactive eLearning platform uses teach-back and gamification functionality to maximise engagement levels and completion rates. More than 80% of participants have completed all modules of the voluntary program.
Stage 2 of the of the Diabetes at School program is currently underway, with a dedicated eLearning program for school nurses due to be launched in 2019.
What some Diabetes at School participants had to say:
“User friendly. Presented with clarity. Specific. Broad range of speakers, Parent, teacher, students each sharing their perspective. Questions acted as a check on understanding; with detailed explanation if answer was incorrect. Thank you for this practical resource in supporting students with Diabetes 1.”
“Nice quick easy burst of education for parents and staff. Makes it not so scary to tackle when the fundamentals are delivered like that. Thank you.”
“Outstanding learning modules – excellent job.”
“Thank you for supporting kids with T1D in their schools. There’s some valuable information in this module for school staff who have none or limited knowledge of Diabetes care. I’m sure it will be a huge relief for parents knowing school staff have some training and understanding of how to care for their T1 kids.”
“Great online learning modules. Full of excellent and helpful information”
“I thought the videos with students, parents and teachers involved were really useful and interesting. One of the better online modules I’ve done.”
“An excellent quick informative package so easily accessible by anyone.”
“Short, sharp and easy to understand. I also loved the little animated video going as I did the questions. Thanks.”
“The stories are powerful and provide a better understanding of what life is like managing diabetes and how to support with empathy”
“Easily understandable modules and great questions makes it almost impossible to fail!”
“Execution of modules were user friendly and a valued part of professional development”