Survey Development
The research team developed an online survey to gather potential core concepts from a wide range of international pharmacology educators. The survey was based on that used for the pilot study (White et al., 2021; see survey in Supplementary Resources). The survey consisted of three parts: (i) theoretical information about core concepts; (ii) a series of demographic questions; and (iii) the key prompt and question to elicit potential core concepts, shown below.
“Imagine your current/recent pharmacology students 3 to 5 years after their graduation: What few essential core concepts would you expect them to remember, understand deeply, and apply effectively in their professional work? Please list a few—ideally between 3 and 7—core concepts that are foundational for pharmacology students in the text box below. Feel free to write as much or as little as you wish about your core concepts. Your draft concepts should be big ideas that are useful to solve problems and enduring, and they should not be topics or facts.”