Building a successful academic and practice partnerships through field trip experiences in health administration education

An important aspect for health administration education is to establish academic and practice partnerships. This presentation introduces an educational model that has been practiced and continuously updated for more than 40 years in the Masters in Health Services Administration Program of UAB. The model currently includes structured weekly field trips to healthcare organizations as an integrated component part of an introductory course in health services administration. Emphasis is always on presentations from practicing health services administrators, especially alumnae/i, about their work, followed by seeing and experiencing the organization. One important purpose of these field trips is to establish an early bridge between students and “real world” healthcare practitioners and organizations. When surveyed, the most positive things gained from the field trips from students perspectives were: seeing different healthcare facilities, interacting with healthcare executives, experiencing “real world” operations related to classroom discussions, and networking opportunities.

After repeated faculty evaluations, an introductory course with integrated field trips to a variety of healthcare facilities is a very effective approach for building stronger relationships between students and different healthcare administrators. Although it takes considerable effort to establish and maintain, the participating organizations and administrators take pride in and seek to remain a part of the process. Partnering with healthcare facilities for initial exposure of students not only builds effective relationships but provides “real world” contacts and opportunities for field work in other courses and part-time employment.