Ways to Improve Foreign Students’ Educational Process at the Department of Histology, Cytology and Embryology, IFNMU

Nowadays the rapid progress in the sphere of medicine stimulates faster development of medical education in Ukraine. Due to this reason one of the priority tasks for the Ivano-Frankivsk National Medical University is to establish cooperation and expand the educational network with foreign countries, attract more foreign citizens to study, as it contributes to the prosperity and further integration of Ukrainian medical science in international scientific and educational community. The Department of Histology, Cytology and Embryology has created modern educational, methodological, scientific, technical and practical facilitates for medical students, including foreign students. An important factor which determines the success of all the implemented educational reforms is the personal relevance of the direct participants in the educational process, namely, teachers and students. Taking into account the above mentioned facts, Department of Histology, Cytology and Embryology conducted an independent anonymous questionnaire among English-speaking second-year students of the Foreign Students Training Faculty. The aim of the study is to find out the attitude of foreign students to the educational process at the Department of Histology, Cytology and Embryology, and after analyzing the results, to draw conclusions aimed at optimizing the educational process of foreign citizens. In total 81 students participated in survey, according to the independent anonymous questionnaire data. At the same time, the total number of English-speaking students who were studying during the period of the survey at the Department of Histology was 108 people. The questionnaire was compiled in accordance to generally accepted requirements regarding the structure of the questionnaire. Foreign students were offered 10 questions in English divided into three groups. The first group included questions aimed at clarifying the opinion of foreign students regarding their syllabus in "Histology, Cytology and Embryology". 78.7% of respondents agreed that the syllabus is relevant and promotes the acquisition of necessary professional skills. However, part of the students (21.3%) believes that the syllabus developed by the Ministry of Health of Ukraine in accordance with the requirements of the international credit and modular system is insufficient for the acquisition of required professional skills. To the next question: "Does the syllabus complexity level encourage students' progress?" the vast majority of respondents (73.8%) answered "yes." Although there were such (26.2%), in whose opinion the level of load on the subject of histology is excessive and this is precisely the reason for the decline in the success of their training. Answers to the questions of the second group demonstrate exactly how foreign students actually evaluate the processes of teaching and learning at the Department of Histology, Cytology and Embryology.