The Workplace Ethics Healthcare Challenge Group (Team Leader: Alison Fisher) (School of Health Sciences) for Educational leadership and Student voice

Alison Fisher, Caroline Henaghan, Catherine Bowden, Doron Cohen, Iain Brassington, Maria Kopsacheili, Rachel Starkey, Richard Keers, Sarah Thompson, Sian Yeowell, Stacey Mcknight, Stephen Miller  

The team is comprised of health science academics and teaching and learning (UCIL) officers who came together to review and redesign the Workplace Ethics Healthcare Challenge.

The Workplace Ethics Healthcare Challenge is a large-scale, two-hour interprofessional workshop for Health Sciences students from nursing, pharmacy, speech and language therapy, audiology and optometry. Established in 2014 as part of the University’s Ethical Grand Challenges programme, the workshop was redesigned following a 2022 review which identified the need for more relevant healthcare scenarios, broader representation of ethical issues and protected characteristics, and richer interdisciplinary discussion. A multidisciplinary Review Group, supported by student feedback and a cross-disciplinary student focus group, undertook a substantial redesign. The workshop now positions students as active ethical decision-makers, requiring them to discuss realistic dilemmas, justify their reasoning, respond to disagreement and understand how different professional perspectives shape ethical practice. An interactive card-sort activity explores issues such as discrimination, confidentiality, safeguarding, infection control, professional boundaries and speaking up. The centrepiece of the redesign is “Jenny’s Story”, an unfolding filmed patient narrative about a young woman with Down syndrome navigating healthcare following the death of her mother. Through video segments and discussion points, students confront issues of communication, capacity, assumptions, diagnostic overshadowing and patient safety. Collaboration with the Down’s Syndrome Association’s Our Voice Group ensured that lived experience shaped the script, content and ethical framing. The redesigned workshop has reached over 1,200 students since implementation. Data indicate strong impact: 88% reported increased awareness of ethical responsibilities, 91% found it interesting and stimulating, 89% identified career-relevant skills, and 76% felt it covered topics not addressed elsewhere. The redesign also provides a transferable model for inclusive, evidence-informed curriculum development.