Peninsula Welcome Event Evaluation Report 2016
Background
The Peninsula Foundation School organises an annual event to help applicants matched to the School make their individual job preferences in stage 2 of the F1 application process. The 2016 Welcome Event was held on Friday 18th March 2016 at Torbay Hospital, Torquay, and a team from each trust attended including Foundation Programme Directors, Foundation Programme Managers/Administrators, rota coordinators and current Foundation trainees.
Content
- Presentations from Peninsula Postgraduate Medical Education – introduction to the day and overview of Foundation Training in the Peninsula
- Career Planning presentation and information stand
- Small Group meetings (20 mins each) through each of the localities in the Peninsula. This was a new feature of the event this year and replaced the use of trust stands.
Objectives of the event
- Introduce the students to the Foundation programme, the Foundation School team and the trusts in the Peninsula
- Give the students the opportunity to hear from each trust, ask questions and gather information
- Give the students the opportunity to hear from current trainees and ask questions about their experience
Attendees were asked to complete a paper-based evaluation form before leaving the event.
Evaluation
188 people were matched to the School for programmes starting in August 2016. 40% (76) attended the event compared with the previous year’s figure of 46% (88). 99% (75) of those attending completed an evaluation form, compared with 69% (61) in 2015.
57% of those who attended the event were local graduates from the Peninsula Medical School. The remaining 43% were graduates from all other medical schools. For F1 2016, the school will be made up of 62 (33%) local graduates and 126 (67%) graduates from other medical schools.
Decision Making
Overall, 39% of attendees made a different decision about their first choice preference as a result of the event. This included students who were initially decided but were undecided after the event. The decision changing effect was higher for local applicants.
Table 1 – Applicants’ preferences following the event
| Changed 1st choice preference | No change to first choice preference | |
| Peninsula students | 19 (44%) | 24 (56%) |
| Non Peninsula students | 10(32%) | 21 (66%) |
| Total | 29 (39%) | 45 (61%) |
As shown in table 2, Royal Devon & Exeter Hospital and Royal Cornwall Hospital were the most popular trusts before the event. After the event, the Royal Cornwall Hospital had an increase of 9 more people (12%) placing them as first choice trust. Royal Devon & Exeter lost 13 students (17%) as their first choice placement.
The number of students who were undecided this year (34%) was much higher than in 2015 (11.5%). This could be explained by the use of a paper evaluation form instead of the online version used in previous years. Using the online system, the students were only able to select one first choice trust but the paper version allowed them to select more than one 1st choice trust which then put them in the undecided category.
Table 2 – First choice trusts
First Choice Before the event After the event
| First Choice | Before the event | After the event |
| Royal Devon & Exeter NHS Foundation Trust | 17 (22%) | 4 (5%) |
| South Devon Healthcare NHS Foundation Trust | 9 (12%) | 10 (14%) |
| Royal Cornwall Hospitals NHS Trust | 15 (20%) | 24 (32%) |
| Plymouth Hospitals NHS Trust | 8 (11%) | 6 (8%) |
| Northern Devon Healthcare NHS Trust | 0 (0%) | 30 (41%) |
| Undecided | 25 (34%) | 30 (41%) |
| Total | 74 | 74 |
* 1 trainee did not answer this question.
Most useful aspects of the event
Attendees were asked what they found most useful from the event and why. 100% of the students provided an answer to this question of which 37 (60%) said that a most useful aspect of the day were the presentations given by the current Foundation trainees and the opportunity to speak to them. In general, attendees’ comments suggested they valued many different aspects of the event as a whole.
The number of comments about the most useful aspect of the day can be found below in table 3.
Table 3 – Most useful aspect of the day
| Most useful aspects | Number of comments |
| Breakout sessions with each Trust | 49 (64%) |
| Talking with F1/F2s | 15 (20%) |
| Meeting other students | 4 (5%) |
| Everything | 4 (5%) |
| Any other aspects | 4 (5%) |
A selection of verbatim comments for ‘most useful aspects of the event’
• Getting the experiences from the F1s - particularly of what the actual rotations/shifts/life in the hospital are like. Great to meet people we will be working with.
• Locality 'speed-dating' is very useful, got answers to questions and learned about things I didn't previously know
• Useful to hear all about the different hospitals and to get FY1 perspectives on it.
• Everything - very welcoming and informative
• It was good to hear about all the localities as even though I am a peninsula student, I haven't been to all the localities.
• Learning about each locality and useful information that would have been difficult to obtain in any other forum
• Really enthusiastic and informative presentations. Very clear indeed.
• Finding out about the F1 jobs itself, on-call rotas, community placements, meeting future colleagues
• Really good to hear from each trust didn’t know a lot about most of them. Opened my mind to a lot.
• Talking to trusts - differences between them. Makes me less nervous about coming
• Talking to foundation doctors and getting their honest opinions
• Opportunities to talk to trainees about experiences. Overview of foundation school talk - good summary and got a feel for ethos of deanery
Suggestions for future events
Attendees were asked if they thought there was anything that could be improved for similar events in the future. Their suggested changes include:
Further information
A few students suggested that it would be good to have more information on the specific jobs that they could take away including accommodation and rotas. It was also suggested that each trust could have a similar hand out of key points. One student commented that it would be good to know how competitive each trust was.
Duration of event and structure
Some students felt the day was too long and some felt it wasn't long enough. Suggestions for change included a shorter induction to allow more time to speak with the current F1s, having lunch earlier and having a more organised place to sit and have lunch to give an opportunity to meet other students and get to know them.
Trust breakout sessions
In general this was a very positive aspect of the day but there were a few suggested changes, which include; a more honest view of the trust in the presentations - some students felt as though it was a sales pitch. Students would like less time for a presentation and more time for informal discussions at the end of each session with the F1s. They would also like more uniformity of presentations as they felt some trusts sold their hospitals better than others.
Other comments
There were also a few other suggestions to improve the event: having video clips of F1 and F2 testimonials to break up the presentation style of the event; a question and answer page that people can write questions down to be answered by the group;. enforce the ice breaker between local and non local students
Would they recommend the event to future applicants?
97% (74) of respondents answered this question and 100% of these confirmed they would recommend the event to applicants in future years.
Summary and Recommendations
The Peninsula Foundation School held a Welcome Event on Friday 18th March 2016 at The Horizon Centre, Torbay Hospital, for those people matched to the School for F1 2016. The aim of the event was to introduce the Foundation Programme and the individual trusts within the Peninsula and give applicants the opportunity to ask questions and gather information to help with ranking post preferences for F1.
76 of 188 (40%) people matched to the School attended the event and 99% (75) of those who attended completed an online evaluation form. All attendees completing the form recommended the event.
Overall, 39% of attendees made a different decision about their first choice preference as a result of the event. The number of students who were undecided after the event was unusually high (41%). This could be explained by the use of a paper evaluation form instead of the online version used in previous years. Using the online system, the students were only able to select one first choice trust but the paper version allowed them to select more than one 1st choice trust which then put them in to the undecided category.
The decision changing effect was more likely for applicants from inside the area. Exeter and Cornwall were the most popular trusts before the event, however, the popularity changed for both trusts with the Royal Cornwall Hospital Trust gaining a further 9 applicants (12%) and Exeter lost 13 applicants (18%) choosing them as 1st choice.
The individual trust breakout sessions and meeting current F1s were the most useful aspects of the day for attendees. There were a number of suggestions for possible improvements that should be considered by the Foundation School Committee for future events. These include:
• The timing of the day and the trust breakout sessions; should more time be given to the trainees and less to the School?
• The format of the breakout sessions and the materials that are given out by each trust
• More structured seating area for lunch to give students the opportunity to get to know each other
• Comparison rates for the relative popularity of trusts included in the school booklet
• A question and answer sheet to allow students to write questions down before the event which can be answered in a group session
• Video testimonials from foundation doctors
The report indicates that the event met the needs of the applicants and provided helpful advice and guidance for selecting their post preferences for F1, although an immediate effect was to create more uncertainty in the cohort. The evaluation shows that there is value in welcoming students to the School.
Additional Comments
What aspects of the event did you find most useful and why?
• Hearing from current juniors regarding their experiences at each of the hospital trusts
• Break out sessions for each deanery
• Getting the experiences from the F1s - particularly of what the actual rotations/shifts/life in the hospital are like. Great to meet people we will be working with.
• Time to talk with current FY1/ FY2
• Chatting to Students. Presentations great
• Very useful
• Being able to ask questions. Seeing photos
• Having a good presentation of each trust
• Chance to hear each locality 'sell itself'
• Talks from people in their locality
• Each trust explaining the pros (mostly) and cons
• The sheet explaining the banding of the jobs
• Locality 'speed-dating' is very useful, got answers to questions and learned about things I didn't previously know
• Chatting to the juniors
• Useful to hear all about the different hospitals and to get FY1 perspectives on it.
• Talks from all the trusts
• Breakaway groups - chance to find out about different trusts
• Different trusts talking
• Really enjoyed the day - thank you
• Hearing from Current F1 at each hospital
• Individual session. Very well organised
• Individual presentations
• Truro and Torbay had excellent presentations. Good to circle around the events
• Hear what F1 is like from the F1s
• Talks by the junior doctors
• Talks from each trust
• Talks from all the trusts
• The different rooms of different hospitals
• Individual presentations were very helpful
• Everything - very welcoming and informative
• Details about each trust really useful
• Presentation, lunch, meeting people
• It was good to hear about all the localities as even though I am a peninsula student, I haven't been to all the localities.
• Learning about each locality and useful information that would have been difficult to obtain in any other forum
• Good level of information. Good talks from different trusts
• All of it. Fantastic welcome
• Personal Talks, pros and cons of each area
• Really enthusiastic and informative presentations. Very clear indeed.
• Finding out about the F1 jobs itself, on-call rotas, community placements, meeting future colleagues
• The different talks
• Honest advice and opinions about each locality. Information booklet from RCHT was great as it gives a description of each job
• Really friendly - got me excited to come down here. Thanks to everyone who organised.
• Honest opinions - good information
• The whole day was useful
• Really good to hear from each trust didn’t know a lot about most of them. Opened my mind to a lot even though I think I want to go to Cornwall
• F1 and F2 experiences. Meeting Peninsula students
• Hearing from F1/F2s. Meeting the other students
• Presentations from trusts. Talking to Peninsula medical students. Hand outs and talk about foundation programme options
• Talking to trusts - differences between them. Makes me less nervous about coming
• Speaking to F1s
• Talking to foundation doctors and getting their honest opinions
• Being able to talk to people from all localities. Career service sound very useful
• Seeing and hearing from different localities, hearing about jobs and practicalities
• Speaking to current F1/2. Get to know more about the areas - nice to be in smaller groups
• Very good overview of the trusts
• Information about deanery and individual trusts
• really useful to see all the different localities from f1 and f2 perspective
• Breakout sessions
• Really enthusiastic presentations really sold the good and bad aspects of each locality
• The F1's and F2's giving talks - real information stuff that we really want to know
• Talking with staff was very useful
• Greater appreciation of job rotas and pros and cons of each locality
• The rotation round the different talks about the trusts
• Overview of all the localities - particularly what the mess offers.
• The individual trust talks
• Hearing the foundations doctors speak about their experiences
• All the talks were very useful
• Talks from localities
• Hearing from the different localities. Truro talk was a lot of fun.
• Opportunities to talk to trainees about experiences. Overview of foundation school talk - good summary and got a feel for ethos of deanery
• Tour of all the hospitals
• Different presentations from each trust
• Good to talk to Plymouth team
What aspects of the event did you find least useful and why?
(5 comments about individual trust presentations have not been included here but fed back separately)
• The introduction session repeated information that was easily available online
• Talking about individual city
• The careers talk felt a bit disjointed but I can see it was necessary
• Things to do with careers - very useful but not a priority right now
• Lectures - Peninsula Deanery Careers service
• The careers session - only because as a PCMD student I know what the services provides already
• Some sessions did run over time
• Intro talk - talk about foundation programme
• Intro talk
• Intro talk - felt a long time was spent discussing F2 abroad - felt this wasn't particularly useful to the majority
• Welcome talk had some stuff that didn’t need to think about yet
• Careers talk
• Deanery talks slightly too dictatorial - too much focus more talking would be better.
• All was very useful
• Its all been good
• Opportunity to talk to the juniors in the jobs we will have next year
How could this event be improved for future attendees?
• More information about what the actual jobs/rotations are like.
• More paper/ information to take home
• Shorter induction at the beginning so that there is more opportunity for informal discussion with Foundation doctors
• Maybe a bit more information on specific jobs and examples
• A lot of repetition
• Map of Torbay hospital - we parked on the wrong side
• It felt very much like a selling opportunity - maybe less of a sales pitch, felt it wasn't always totally honest
• More organised lunch - a place to sit and chat with everyone
• Concise comparison table of the trusts. Perhaps information about competitiveness for each trust
• A map provided before the event to show where the building was and where to park
• Information on accommodation for each would be useful
• Video clips of F1 and F2 testimonials (that was all I could think of)
• More information about individual rotating and rotas
• If each locality could have a hand out with a summary of key points
• Example rotas but understand this is difficult due to the new contracts
• More information about accommodation
• Perhaps extend the day longer
• Have lunch earlier
• Slightly more warning if you have a place before hand to organise travel arrangements. However Trudi was more than happy to help - Thanks!
• Maybe have a q and a paper at lunchtime that people can write questions down on - so If at the end of the day if lots f people have asked the same question it can be answered by the group
• Less 'selling' and more on negative aspects
• Slightly shorter talks - maybe chat at the end of each session with trusts after questions - sometimes there was an awkward silence
• Enforce ice breaker
• Longer time speaking to F1s
• More uniformity of presentations
• Some localities sold their hospitals better than others
• Has been really well organised, don’t think any aspects need changing
• Enforce talk between PMS and non-PMS students. e.g. 5 minutes sit down between one PMS and 2 non PMS
• Time dedicated to discuss jobs and rotas
• Maybe if each trust had an informal hand out (so I can remember which was which)
• Maybe not so long
• Probably didn't need to be quite so long
Is there any additional information you would have liked to have seen in your welcome pack? Please comment on whether you found the information useful.
• Map - otherwise very useful
• F2 Bandings choosing both so would be helpful
• Useful selection of relevant information
• Was useful - hard to know about banding etc.
• Print out of all the jobs would be great
• More info about individual jobs, especially the new ones added
• A hand out about applications for F2 abroad - how can we ensure we get a place etc.
• Yes, especially the banding of different jobs
• Perhaps a breakdown of aspects of some job rotations that are unique to that trust
• Rotas
• Yes - would like to know where most people go for accommodation in each location
• Very comprehensive thanks
• Having locality booklets emailed out
• All very useful - perhaps information on accommodation available
• Found information really useful
• A colour printed copy of the job list maybe?
• Full print out of all jobs to rank
• Any specific military rotas would be helpful
Please provide any additional comments about the day
• Well organised and very useful. Glad I made the journey down.
• Thank you
• Thank you to all for organising this
• Great, Thanks
• Very good. Very friendly admin staff and speakers
• Good organisation
• Everywhere is amazing
• Thank you - well organised and very friendly
• Really useful and informative day
• Truro presentation was particularly good
• Excellent day, friendly and positive staff
• Thank you - informative and very friendly
• Great day. Thank you for the free food and drink
• Really great and felt welcomed as a non-peninsula student
• Good lunch, thanks
• It was great, thank you very much
• I thought the event ran very smoothly, good amount of time allocated
• Brilliant - thanks
• Thanks for organising today. Has really helped me to get an idea of all the trusts. It was great talking to current trainees.
• Thank you. Very well organised
• Useful and very enjoyable
• Thank you for a very useful day
• Really useful talks thank you and every locality looks great will be difficult to decide where to go but I think it'll be good wherever I end up
• Feel even more excited about coming to peninsula - felt really welcomed
• Great day and well organised - thank you.
• Really good - thank you