Curriculum Innovations: Canada's Health System and Health Policy
Times Change. Paul Williams and Raisa Deber have combined the Core Courses and
Canadian Politics and Health Policy into a new, 3-course sequence which integrates the
system-level issues which were once the foundation of Canada's Health Care System, with a
"Policy Toolkit" intended to make sense out of a rapidly changing, highly
politicized environment. Rather than writing a term paper or journal entries,
students now learn to craft briefing notes analyzing current topics, ranging from
Walkerton to health care funding to private clinics.
In the first course, the
toolkit incorporates "ideas, institutions, and interests;" this is expanded in
the second course to look at such topics as agenda setting, regulation, and decision
making. Panels of experts provide insight on specific topics. The course has
benefited greatly from an expert group of tutors (many of whom are alumni) who have
first-hand knowledge of the health system as practitioners and managers, and who can
demonstrate how theoretical concepts can be applied to practice. In the third
course, new faculty member Adalsteinn Brown will address key methodologies often used for
policy analysis (e.g., economic analysis, small area variation studies).
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