Å utvikle yrkeskompetanse gjennom arbeidslivspraksis i helsesekretærutdanningen

This article presents findings from a three-year research and development project where a high school and a hospital collaborated on the education of medical secretaries. The aim was to strengthen the medical secretary students’ development of vocational competence through close collaboration between the school and the hospital on practice periods for the students. The results are based on qualitative data from observations of the students during practice, observations of students when experiences from practice were presented at school, group interviews with students, teachers and instructors, and analyses of students’ reflection logs. The findings show that cooperation between the parties to define key functions and tasks in the work of medical secretaries, and to structure practice periods around these tasks, contributed to the students getting a great learning benefit from practice. The students expressed that they understood what the vocation was about, began to identify with it and felt the need to learn theory. However, they wanted better coherence between learning in practice and at school. The results suggest that mandatory practice periods and common structure for learning content in practice and at school should be main principles in the new curriculum for education of medical secretaries from autumn 2020.