Global Health Network (GHNet) Supercourse

This initiative draws on a networking strategy to increase access to academic information using information and communication technologies (ICTs). In addition to PowerPoint, organisers are using multiple knowledge channels including hand-helds (pocket-sized computing devices), and podcasting (the episodic release of digital media files, either audio or video, for download through web syndication).

Specifically, Supercourse is an information sharing and open source model according to which global academic faculty share what they consider their best lectures in the area of public health. The idea is to allow experienced faculty members to revise lectures that are not cutting-edge, new instructors to reduce preparation time and improve their lectures, and faculty in developing countries to gain access to current scientific information that they would not otherwise have. Supercourse lectures are available in many languages. Organisers have also sought to create lectures quickly specifically in response to major disasters and emergencies, such as Hurricanes Rita and Kristina, the Bam and Pakistan Earthquakes, and the Avian Influenza (avian flu, or bird flu) crisis. They identify a "lecture of the week" to help draw attention to particular lectures; for example, during the week of January 8 2007, the highlighted lecture was "Measuring Immunization Coverage among Pre-School Children: Past, Present and Future Opportunities. Part I."

This process is facilitated by the Global Health Network (GHNet), which includes faculty members (e.g. Deans, Chair persons, Professors, Associate or Assistant Professors) in academia who provide, review, and/or translate the Supercourse lectures. These persons are also the major user group of the Supercourse. They engage in a teaching-support system that attempts to distinguish itself from distance learning initiatives by providing lectures to the teachers of students in medical, dental, and nursing schools, and public health programmes. These teachers will then reach out to students in their midst. Statistical quality assurance is facilitated by an open peer-review system, student rating of the lectures, and the tracking of ratings over time using systems developed by Deming for Industry (Statistical Quality Control).

To ensure as broad access to the lectures as possible, the network has established 45 Supercourse mirrored servers in medical, dental, veterinary, nursing, and public health schools around the world, as well as distributed 20,000 Supercourse CDs (free of charge). An effort has been made to increase presentation speed through the development of small-sized files for the benefit of users from developing countries who have low-bandwidth internet connections. For the benefit of those who do not have easy access to scientific information (beyond lecture material), online textbooks have been provided by the British Medical Journal (BMJ): Statistics at Square One and Epidemiology for the Uninitiated. Organisers have also created "legacy lectures", which are "the best of the best"; the goal is to archive them in 170 national libraries around the world. Another work in progress includes the building of schools of public health worldwide: Scientists from 26 nations are working to establish small, mini certificate-granting courses.

Entertaining strategies are another component of Supercourse. Organisers have developed a hypertext comic book that translates the lectures into a web-based, icon-driven format with graphic presentation and text that allows students to access more information through hyperlinks. To read more about this comic book, click here.

In an effort to increase awareness about Supercourse, GHNet has published over 170 papers in medical journals including the Science, Nature, Lancet, British Medical Journal, and Nature Medicine, among others.

Health, Education.

Organisers say (February 2009): "Within 24 hours we had a top scientific lecture for H1N1, in 2 days it was translated into 11 languages and was the top ranked Swine Flu lecture. It was presented to 50 million people in China..."