Program
Outcomes
Student Outcomes
The outcomes of the Vietnam experience for the students are varied. Our in-country and return-to-Australia interviews with students and student presentations to their classmates show that their learning goals of developing generic and discipline specific skills are achieved. The range of learning outcomes are reported in the publications arising from the project (see resources section on right) Importantly, in the return-to-Australia interviews, publications and presentations which the students have prepared independently, and in contact in the years following graduation, many students have reflected on their Vietnam experience as a life changing event.
Student Outcomes: Sally - A mini-case
study
Sally was a final year student
involved in the first Vietnam placements
in 2001. One of her primary goals was to develop her experience in working with children with hearing impairment, so she spent time with a couple of other students at a regional school for deaf children as well as at Phu My Orphanage. Sally agreed to take on the daily student-staff liaison role for those students in the regional centre in the periods when staff were not on site. She also took responsibility for supporting the young, inexperienced interpreter sourced to work with the students and the teachers in the deaf school. She believes this experience of 'trust' and leadership significantly developed her confidence, intercultural competence, team and communication skills, as well as her clinical skills.
On graduation Sally won the prestigious
new-graduate position at a major Australian
children's hospital.
Her employer, Ms Jeanette Cowell reported to us:
In 2002, I employed Sally, a Charles Sturt University graduate, into our new graduate speech pathologist position. With so many undergraduates vying for the one position each year, the culling process is always difficult. Therefore, indicating on your resume that you've done a placement in an orphanage in Vietnam was certainly going to get noticed. Sally didn't disappoint. I do believe that her overseas experience added to her confidence and ability to negotiate successfully, to her creativity in therapy and made her more sensitive and appropriate in her dealings with people of other cultural and linguistic backgrounds; all hugely important skills for working in a speech pathology team in a large metropolitan paediatric hospital.
Sally has since completed a post-graduate degree specialising in hearing impairment, worked in state education department settings and is now working in a senior role in another major Australian children's hospital. We funded Sally to return to Vietnam in 2006 to supervise our students at Phu My. Not only did Sally provide excellent supervision (as reported to us by the students) but she was able to reflect on the changes in herself and in Phu My since 2001. She believes her time in Vietnam and the generic and discipline specific skills she developed in that time have had a profound impact on her as a person and a professional, and helped shaped her career and life interests. She was struck by the changes in the way some staff at Phu My are now seeking actively to foster independence and communication opportunities for the children.