QEP Resources: Sample QEP Activities and Student Report

QEP Problem Solving Activity                                              

CIT ___ Assignment 2

You are a new IT professional and excited about your new job. Your supervisor says the company needs to improve their security protocols and has given you and your team the task or developing the requirements.

You know when employees having trouble remembering passwords, risky security behavior can result. A recent report stated:

                39% of Respondents Write Down Passwords and 49% of Respondents Reuse Passwords

https://digitalguardian.com/blog/uncovering-password-habits-are-users-password-security-habits-improving-infographic

You want to keep your job and impress your supervisor. How do you solve the problem?

Problem Solving Activity

Proper Nutrition for the Elderly Population

Nurse Aide

Sarah works as a home health aide for a local company, under the direction of a registered nurse.  She   makes daily visits to the elderly.

She prepares meals and notes the typical diet to be as follows:

Breakfast: one egg and a small glass of mild orange juice

Lunch:  Lunchmeat sandwich with a small dish of applesauce and one banana

Dinner: One can of soup and a muffin

Sarah is concerned that her clients aren’t getting enough protein. She discusses her concerns with a friend who is taking a nutrition class.  Her friend told her that as long as the elderly eat a healthy breakfast, they are getting enough protein.  

As a result, Sarah believes that her clients are getting enough protein and doesn’t notify the RN of her concerns. She continues to provide meals as above.

1. Examine the evidence:                           Is there evidence to support Sarah’s belief that her patients are getting enough

       protein? What additional evidence would be needed to better evaluate her       

       conclusion?

2. Define the problem:                                What was the problem you or your team worked to solve

3. Identify strategies:                                  What different ways did you consider in solving your problem?

4. Analyze potential solutions:                 How did you decide which strategy was best?

5. Implement the solution:                        How did you solve the problem?

6. Reflect on the outcome:                        After reviewing the results, was the solution complete?

      Were there other factors to consider or additional work needed?

On a scale of 1 – 10, with 10 being the highest, how would you rate your problem-solving ability for this project?

Fall 2019 QEP Examples:

Also, I used the following in my astronomy classes that am thinking would be open-ended enough for a QEP assignment for those classes:

One of the biggest discoveries that could be made in astronomy would be the detection of life elsewhere, either on another planet in our solar system or in star systems near to us. Recently, evidence has been put forth to suggest the existence of large planets around hundreds of nearby stars and that some meteorites recovered from Antarctica may have had their origins at Mars.  In one case, the claim has been made that evidence may exist within one of these of microfossils left by primitive Martian bacteria.  In your opinion, does such evidence warrant continued expenditures by our government for the search for extraterrestrial life?  Support your opinion using available budget allotments, potential impact on our civilization, and/or other material that you can use in support of you opinion. 

Below is a example of a class activity that could be used to incorporate problem-solving strategies into the curriculum to support the QEP. (See PDF version below.)

SNOWSTORM SURVIVAL

Here’s the situation:

It’s 2:00 P.M. on a Friday and you look out your office window. The sky is white and snow is lightly falling.

You keep working on a project that you’ve been involved with all week. By 4:00 PM the snow has increased but there are only 1-2 inches on the ground. You decide to keep working…

By 4:30 P.M. you realize you are looking out the window at a fierce blizzard. You can barely see the building across the street. You realize that if you’re going to get home, you’d better leave at once. You’re not too worried, since you have a six-passenger Jeep with four-wheel drive.

You text your spouse/significant other/family to say you are leaving and expect to be home by 7:00 P.M.

When you get to the lobby, you meet several of your colleagues who are trying to decide what to do, all of whom live forty miles north, in the same general area as you.

You offer to take anyone who wants to come along with you, and five agree. You finally make it to the Jeep, warm up the engine, and take off in four-wheel drive headed for the highway. At first, traffic is minimal but the highway is soon jammed and you decide to take a familiar detour through the country.

The snow continues and within an hour your sturdy Jeep is unable to make any headway against two-foot drifts. You stop and give your passengers the bad news. There’s less than half a tank of gas left, you’re at least five miles from the nearest farmhouse, and all you have are the following items in the Jeep:

The weather report on the radio is dire and the news sinks in:  You are stuck miles from shelter in one of the worst snowstorms to ever hit your area. It is now 7:00 P.M.

Directions:

1. Within your group of 6, rank your top 5 items. Please rank additional items if time permits.

2. Using the Problem-solving steps listed below, talk about each one as you worked on the Snowstorm example:           

Examine the evidence

Define the problem

Identify strategies

Analyze potential solutions

Implement the solution

(See below for PDF version.)

Critical-Thinking

Social Media

FYE 105

Sara would like to be a nurse and is currently taking Anatomy and Physiology. While taking a break from studying, she sees a social media post about the importance of social skills. The post stated:

Harvard and Carnegie studies related to career success indicate that 85 percent of future success is based on social skills, with only 15 percent related to technical skills.

As a result, Sara believes her time is best spent on social media building her social network so she can be successful in her nursing career.

1. How strongly does the information provided support Sara's conclusion?

2. Provide two alternative explanations for the results of the study, besides Sara’s conclusion.

3. Identify three types of additional information we would need to fully evaluate Sara’s conclusion that her time is best spent on social media. Explain why each type of information would be helpful.

Defined goals:  Knowledge of lab tests and interpretation to diagnose disease – be able to select appropriate lab tests based upon patient symptoms, be able to identify possible diseases and be able to select tests to differentiate each possibility.

Question prompt:  A 23 year old male presents to the ED with increasing fatigue, sore throat, earaches, headaches, and episodic fever and chills over the past week. Physical exam reveals erythematous throat and tonsils and swollen lymph nodes. The physician believes the patient has strep throat.

Skill 1:  How strongly does the evidence support the doctor’s preliminary diagnosis?

[Student should consider all possibilities for the patient’s symptoms.]

Skill 2:  Provide 3 alternative diagnoses for the patient’s symptoms other than strep throat.

[Student should consider leukemia or lymphoma, infectious mononucleosis, other viral infections.]

Skill 3:  Identify the laboratory tests and pertinent results that would help support each of the possible diagnoses.

[Strep throat could be detected with a positive rapid Strep A test or positive culture; leukemia/lymphoma could be detected with a CBC and peripheral blood smear or biopsy; infectious mono could be detected with a positive monospot test or atypical lymphocytes on peripheral blood smear; other viral infections could be detected with serological testing.]