Project EnhAnCE-IT: Enhancing Addiction Counseling Education through Integrative Technology - Project EnhAnCE-IT will Enhance Addiction Care Education through Integrative Technology by developing and implementing Addiction Care Essentials (AddCare), a six-module online curriculum incorporating video tutorials that feature culturally diverse addictions care experts demonstrating essential practices such as screening, brief intervention, and referral to treatment (SBIRT). AddCare is integrated into existing curriculum or as a standalone training.
Project EnhAnCE-IT and its online AddCare curriculum will be developed and implemented at Kent State University (KSU), the second largest state-supported university in Ohio. Video production and distance education resources at KSU will be employed. Videos will be filmed on-campus in the TeleProductions studio. Video tutorials will feature addictions care experts from the Northeast Ohio region, including those practicing in top-ranked area hospitals. They will (a) deliver content on pharmacology, prevention, assessment and diagnosis, and treatment of substance use disorders (SUDs), (b) demonstrate corresponding principles and essential skills by interviewing simulated clients, and (c) debrief their demonstration for viewers. Students will be exposed to the same simulated clients, viewing separate video-recorded client monologues and then responding asynchronously to practice the skills demonstrated by featured experts. Once edited and approved by an expert advisory board, video tutorials will be incorporated into the online AddCare curriculum, housed in Blackboard Learn, the course management system used by KSU. Distance education staff will assist with this process. The goals of Project EnhAnCE-IT and its online AddCare curriculum are to (1) add relevant and essential curricular content to existing undergraduate and graduate addictions counseling curriculum; (2) provide online access to addictions care curriculum to non-counseling undergraduate and graduate students, including those at one of KSU’s seven regional campuses; (3) complement existing face-to-face addictions counseling curriculum with online and interactive content; (4) incorporate addiction issues into the graduate counseling core curriculum to meet accreditation requirements; (5) expose students to culturally diverse experts and models in addictions counseling featured in video tutorials; (6) provide students opportunity to practice demonstrated skills and receive feedback; and (7) make addictions counseling education accessible beyond KSU to in-career counseling professionals for continuing education credit. Six months after implementation at KSU, at least 75% of students who participated in AddCare will report increased knowledge of SUDs and addiction care practices and greater acceptance of persons with SUDs (i.e., lower stigma). It also will be rated as accurate and complementary/synergistic to current addictions counseling curriculum by advisory board members. The number of students who pursue further addictions counseling education will increase by at least 25% in the first year. It is estimated that 250 persons will participate in AddCare in Year 1 of the project, an additional 300 persons in the second year of the project, and approximately 150 persons each year throughout the lifetime of the project.
