Abstract:

Background:
The Community Health Project provides a unique experience for health professions students to engage their community and expand professional development beyond the classroom. Students from multiple disciplines are matched with local community health agencies and participate in an eight-week internship, which culminates in a collaborative project. The immersive educational experience gives students primary insight into the health inequities they will encounter in their professional work.

Purpose:
To explore the educational benefits of community health experiences for health professions students.

Methods:
Across the 8-week internship, the weekly journals of fourteen Community Health Project student interns were assessed using direct thematic qualitative analysis. Themes of knowledge, skills, and behavior were used to categorize the benefits of immersive community health education and describe examples of career development.

Results:
Thematic analysis revealed increase in public health knowledge (n=165), intent to change behavior (n=26), and professional skills development (n=75).

Discussion:
Common themes included the ability to develop professional skills such as public speaking, inter-professional networking, and project presentation. Additionally, students reported gains in knowledge about local health agency operations, pressing community health concerns, and initiatives to improve public health. Students demonstrated this knowledge as advocates for their agencies. Throughout the internship, students also indicated a desire to change their behaviors to better understand and consider health barriers their future patients may face.

Conclusion:
The eight week integrative and collaborative experience with local community-based agencies enhances student understanding of health promotion and disease prevention issues, and provides the opportunity for professional skills development not often obtained from the classroom experience. Students gain first-hand insight into barriers to health care access and are often inspired to pursue community health education for their future practice.

Keywords:

Interprofessional, education, community, multidiscipline, students, community health.