A Co-Curricular Mentoring Experience Provides Student Pharmacists with Areas for Professional Growth

Background and purposeThe Pharmacy Innovation Experience and Research (PIER) program aims to provide student pharmacists with co-curricular experiences that augment their essential soft skill training while recruiting underrepresented minority (URM) high school and undergraduate students to the pharmacy profession. The goal of the PIER mentoring program is to enhance the leadership, professionalism, teaching, and cultural sensitivity skills of student pharmacists through their participation in the program.Educational activity and settingDuring this pilot study, student pharmacists were trained to mentor high school and undergraduate students prior to the start of PIER. Pre- and post-program surveys were used to assess the self-perceived benefit PIER had on the soft skill development of student pharmacists. Survey responses were analyzed using unpaired t-tests.FindingsThere was an observed increase in self-perceived abilities among student pharmacists in mentoring (82% versus 68%), leading a team (94% versus 82%), and teaching (77% versus 64%). In post-program surveys, 90% of the students viewed their experience as useful for their career versus 71% in pre-surveys. While a high percentage felt comfortable interacting with diverse participants (90%) and knowledgeable about diversity issues in healthcare (89%), the data indicated that the PIER program did not have a quantifiable impact on their cultural sensitivity.SummaryPIER is a co-curricular program for student pharmacists that enhances self-perception of essential soft skills for their careers. Nevertheless, additional assessment of the skills gained through PIER is needed to verify competency. Other schools of pharmacy should recognize the importance of programs like PIER to both recruit URMs to pharmacy schools and provide current students with a co-curricular experience that will encourage their success.