Organising the Study Visits

'It provides the opportunity to strut your stuff as an institution but also throw your doors open'

It is the responsibility of each of the hosts to organise their study visit but the project manager and other members of the community will also be involved.

Your schedule of study visits will have been agreed at the start-up meeting and it is a good idea to agree dates as soon as possible after that meeting. Coming to an agreement on this can be quite a complex and time-consuming process but technology can help us here. The system that we used for the CAMEL pilot was 'Meet o Matic'. It is free and very easy to use.
You choose the theme for each study visit based upon discussions at the start-up meeting, internal experience and knowledge, and evaluations from previous study visits. Also some areas of interest or discussion points will result from the inter-visit communications.
In setting the agenda you need to remember that the discussions, group work, evaluation, hands-on sessions and demonstrations are just as important (perhaps even more so) as the presentations. For this reason it is a good idea to schedule in these types of sessions; otherwise some of your presenters will ignore the clock and use all the time that they can get away with for their presentation. After all - they are usually passionate about their subject and will have lots of interesting ideas and experience to share with the members of the community. Sample agendas showing timings and different types of sessions are included in the 'resources' section. Try to include some time at the start for participants to share what they have been doing since the last visit.
Your presenters, demonstrators and facilitators will need to be fully briefed on the nature of the study visits and understand the confidentiality and trust agreements of the community. As sharing practice is 'calzon quitao' your presenters must be willing to share actual experience, what didn't work so well as well as what happened according to plan, and be prepared to take part in what sometimes can be very difficult discussions. A quote from the CAMEL pilot illustrates these points very well - 'It's about practice warts and all - and the warts are more interesting than the practice sometimes'.
After an initial draft of the agenda has been agreed with the presenters (timings and titles), circulating the document for feedback will keep everyone 'in the loop' and lead to a collaboratively organised study visit that is more likely to meet the various needs of the community and be more productive.
Community members will find it useful if session synopses are circulated prior to the study visit and electronic copies of the actual presentations made available after.
You will need to agree who will take notes (and possibly photographs) to provide a record of the visit. Video and sound recording provide excellent documentation but require more time, effort and experience in setting up, running and editing.
The room layout requirements will vary depending on the type and mix of sessions but there will always be a requirement for a configuration that allows for group discussions. In the CAMEL model pilot, we found that a restaurant or cabaret style layout worked very well enabling easy movement from presentation to group discussions. Using a lecture room style with a group facility elsewhere in the room allows movement between sessions with a greater possibility of participants changing groups. If there are a small number of participants, then a boardroom style or 'u'-shape can work well although group work needs some reorganisation of the chairs. Some group work may produce posters or require templates to be completed and then shared with the rest of the participants; being able to display these on walls or boards facilitates the sharing and subsequent discussions. Room layouts are shown in the 'resources' section.

Simple things can make all the difference to the energy levels of the group: bottled water and biscuits/fruit available all day, plenty of natural light, a feeling of space and room to be able to move around.
On the day you will need a chair and/or timekeeper who is ruthless about keeping presenters to time in order to ensure there is adequate time for discussion. Presenters must understand that discussion is just that and not simply questions and answers about the presentation. The chair should act as a facilitator to ensure that discussions are even-handed and relevant.

Remember that the study visit is about showcasing and sharing. It should assist you in the reflection process, put practices into a wider context and challenge assumptions so that hopefully you see things about your institution and about your practices etc that you were blind to. 'You don't just share everything that's good and that you are proud of but you are also prepared to share your problems and issues and perhaps find ways of solving those together'.

Using the CAMEL Model to Build a Community of Practice

Applying the Model

Related Video

More...