The individual assignments and group projects in Phase 1 have been designed to allow you to explore aspects of medicine that are of particular interest to you or that you need to address in order to meet the requirements of the Phase 1 portfolio examination. The individual assignments and group projects offered in each course will be related to course themes rather than to the individual scenarios within a course. During the course of Phase 1, you must attempt at least one Negotiated individual assignment. You must also satisfactorily complete at least 4 Student-Patient Observed Communication Assessment (SOCA) Tasks.
Each course will offer a choice of individual assignments and group projects. You must complete one individual assignment and one group project in each course. Projects and assignments are marked with an overall grade, and grades for each capability addressed in that assignment/project. These are either focus capabilities or generic capabilities.
An assignment or project will have a specific focus on two of the eight graduate capabilities
Generic Capabilities for assignments
In addition, all assignment reports are required to address the capabilities of:
Generic Capabilities for group projects
In addition, all project reports are required to address the capabilities of:
Each of the last three capabilities will be assessed for each project and assignment, using ‘generic’ criteria described in the Assessment section of the Program Guide. If the project or assignment also has one or two of these capabilities as a focus, additional criteria to the generic criteria will be used when the focus capabilities are assessed.
The length for reports is 1500 –2000 (max) words for an individual assignment; and 2000 – 2500 (max) for a group project. The word limit for assignments and projects includes all text in the report, apart from the cover page, Acknowledgement of Country (if this is included) and the reference list. Reports over these lengths may be penalized in the grading. Projects or assignments that result in posters or other education materials or resources will require a written report to explain the research undertaken, the judgments made in developing the materials, and to provide evidence that the socio-cultural context of the target group has been taken into account. One additional file may be submitted as supporting evidence. This may be a poster, leaflet, video or audio file for example.
Group projects are designed for 4 to 6 students. Group project reports should present a coherent and focused response to the project task or question. They should not be a simple compilation of the individual reports of group members.
During Phase 1 of the program, you are required to negotiate at least one assignment. One capability focus of a negotiated assignment is Self-direction and critical evaluation, and the criteria for this focus are set. The additional capability focus and other details are negotiated using an outline linked below. You may negotiate an assignment on a relevant topic of your choosing in any course in the Phase, although you should only do so after you are quite familiar with the process of assessment.
All assignments and projects must be referenced correctly. Correct referencing includes citing the origin of your ideas, information etc. in the body of your assignment or project as well as listing them at the end.
UNSW Medicine recommends following the APA (American Psychological Association) Citation Style. This style was chosen as it offers clear guidelines for citing a variety of information, particularly electronic and multimedia sources.
Examples and help using the UNSW Medicine APA Citation guide available in the Assessment section of your Moodle course modules.
The UNSW Library also has a useful eBook on APA style available.
Beins, B.C. (2012). APA Style Simplified : Writing in Psychology, Education, Nursing, and Sociology. Wiley. [Electronic version via UNSW Library]
All assignment and project reports must be submitted through eMed Portfolio. The Faculty scans all items submitted to the eMed Portfolio system using Turnitin, a commercial similarity detection software. Items submitted are also compared to other items already in the system.
The eMed Portfolio system is designed to support 'blind' grading --where the assessor does not know the identity of the student(s) whose work is being assessed.
Accordingly you should not put your name in the files that you submit to the system. Instead you should put your student number on the cover page, and in a header or footer, so that the student number appears on each page of each file submitted.
In the case of group projects, include the student numbers of all students in the group on the cover page, and the number of the student who submitted the project files on each page of each file submitted.
Reports should be written in MS Word (submitted as a .doc file) or RTF (rich text format) using 12 point font (preferably Times New Roman or Helvetica/Arial) and should be one and a half or double spaced. You must include a word count on the title page of your report.
All student work is stored electronically, and is available to examiners throughout Phase 1 and subsequent Phases of the program. For ease of access by multiple users, written reports should be submitted in Word or RTF format. Patient education materials such as brochures and booklets may be developed using other programs, but should be submitted as supporting files in PDF format.
The following formats are be supported:
Students submitting a website should submit a zip file to eMed if possible but if the Website is too large (over 15Mb) then you should submit a dummy file on eMed and hand in a USB that is clearly labelled with your student number and the receipt number of your project to the Medicine Education & Student Office.
Please note that if you submit on USB, it will be destroyed after marking and will not be available for your Portfolio.
