Biomedical and Behavioral Research Scientists: Their Training and Supply Volume I: Findings (1989) / Chapter Skim
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4. Towards Measuring the Effectiveness of NRSA Training Programs
4. Towards Measuring the Effectiveness of NRSA Training Programs
Pages 67-78
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From page 67... ...
CHAPTER 4 TOWARD MEASURING THE EFFECTIVENESS OF NRSA TRAINING PROGRAMS OVERVIEW NRSA personnel programs are designed to ensure the adequate supply and quality of biomedical and behavioral researchers. The principal mechanisms are fellowships, which influence individual career choices, and training grants, which also strengthen institutional training capabilities.
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From page 68... ...
THE AIMS AND EFFECTS OF TRAINING AND FELLOWSHIP PROGRAMS The overall goals of NRSA personnel programs are easier to state than to achieve. As a matter of policy, they are intended to ensure that the Supply of biomedical and behavioral research personnel is sufficient to meet the demand, that their quality is high enough to meet the needs of a constantly improving level of biomedical research, and that the pool of skills is responsive to shifts in the demand for various kinds of specialized personnel.
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From page 69... ...
Training grants may be best at enhancing institutional training capacities, for instance by expanding the number of traineeships, providing a departmental focus, or enhancing opportunities for cross-disciplinary training and research. However, it is an open question whether trainees receive different educational experiences than other graduate students in the same departments.
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From page 70... ...
THE EVALUATION OF TRAINING AND FELLOWSHIP PROGRAMS Recent evaluation activities related to the NRSA programs have addressed the above questions and serve to identify areas of highest priority for future research. (A detailed discussion of these activities is found in the commissioned paper by Georgine Pion, found in Volume III of this report.)
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From page 71... ...
Recent evaluation activities have instead sought the much more modest goal of providing some facts about certain aspects of the program. Most were outcome studies that examined selected aspects of the subsequent careers of recipients and compared them to persons who did not receive NRSA support.
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From page 72... ...
The subsequent research involvement of M.D.s who had received an NIH fellowship also greatly exceeded the comparison group of self-identified researchers and teachers. However, M.D.s who had received NIH postdoctoral support under a training grant were less likely to be involved in research than the comparison group of self-identified researchers and teachers.
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From page 73... ...
Similarly, there have been no evaluations of the effect of training grants on the training capacity or training efficiency of recipient institutions. Data Needs for Program Evaluation Program statistics on the number and characteristics of persons receiving each type of award are the most basic information about the training received by NRSA recipients.6 To provide this information, NIH sponsored the creation of the Trainee Fellow File, which provides information on all NRSA students, and the Consolidated Grant Application File, which contains information on programs for advanced research training and on institutional awards.
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From page 74... ...
Little is known about how the characteristics of a training" program affect the research abilities of persons who participate in that training. Although the recent evaluation studies suggest that NRSA training is correlated with success as a researcher, the correlations are very small: the total effect of NRSA training and other indicators of preexisting quality explained only 6-14 percent of the variance in outcome measures.
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From page 75... ...
Recent evaluation studies have tended to focus exclusively on the single measure of publications and the single characteristic of whether or not the trainee sought funding from NIH. The committee recommends that future studies consider a broader spectrum of outcome measures, including the following: o o o o o o o o receipt of a Ph.D.
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From page 76... ...
trainees apply for and receive NIH research grants, according to Wyngaarden, and some training programs merely serve as support vehicles for subspecialty clinical training. He calls for a comprehensive, critical review of NIH research training programs, specifically whether examining current training programs for physician/scientists should be modified.
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From page 77... ...
Those committee members who have experience in the training of physician/scientists endorse the suggestions made by Smith and Goldstein and suggest that the following changes be made in the postdoctoral institutional training programs for physician/sc~entists: a true consortium between the clinical and preclinical departments of the institution, with shared responsibility for the design and administration of the program, selection of trainees based on evidence of some previous experience in research and overall promise; ~ o formal course. work in the physical and biochemical sciences sufficient to give graduates a theoretical background comparable to those with graduate degrees in the biological sciences; not less than three years of research training, primarily in direct research experience under the supervision of a mentor; and modules of instruction, specifically tailored to the needs of the physician trainee, in such areas as basic laboratory techniques, chromatography, radioimmunoassay, protein purification, advanced instrumental techniques, fundamental principles of enzymology and molecular biology, subcellular i.
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From page 78... ...
The evaluation must also define what constitutes "success." For example, although this committee may conclude that institutional training grants need to be revised, it also recognizes that even in their current form, these programs have made a positive contribution. Graduates of the institutional training grants have populated all the clinical departments-in our medical schools and, even during their short training periods, they have done valuable research work in the laboratories of established investigators.
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