Exploring the Impact of Reflecting upon Pharmacy Experts’ Written Career Guidance on Student Professional Identity Formation (original) (raw)

Study Objective: To explore the impact of reading and critically reflecting upon professional development guidance provided by pharmacy experts upon student professional identity formation (PIF). Methods: Fifteen second professional year student pharmacists completed an elective course assignment to read 20 published personal letters from Letters to a Young Pharmacist, in which pharmacy experts offer career and life guidance to novice or student pharmacists. From those, each student selected four letters and for each composed a 500 to 600-word critical reflection describing the impact of the letter, yielding 60 reflections for thematic analysis. Each author individually analyzed and coded de-identified reflections for up to 3 types of impact. Data were then grouped for similarity and collapsed into themes; overarching evidence of transformative thinking and “eye-opening” were also coded. Results: Of 60 reflections, 160 types of impact were identified, and were grouped into five t...