DOI: 10.12688/mep.21762.1 ISSN: 2312-7996

From Theory to Impact: Outcomes from a Learning Theory-Driven Pilot Premedical Pathway Program

Dara Bright, Tajma Cameron, Holly Rockingham, Horace DeLisser, Juliana Mosley-Williams, Bernard Lopez, Guy Hewlett, , Leon McCrea
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Background/Introduction Premedical pathway programs serve as a vehicle to advance equity and access for students who have experienced systemic barriers to education, yet few programs explicitly address the academic competency development necessary for success in rigorous science courses. Undergraduate premedical students face significant cognitive load, and success requires both content knowledge and metacognitive learning strategies (MLS) needed to process, integrate, and retrieve information. Methods This pilot study examined whether a learning-theory-driven summer intensive grounded in self-regulated learning (SRL) and delivered by a trained learning specialist produced significant gains in students’ skill and motivation. A pre-post design was employed with 16 students in the Program. The Learning and Study Strategies Inventory (LASSI) was administered at program entry and exit; a qualitative survey was analyzed using deductive thematic coding. Results/Findings Paired samples t-tests revealed significant gains in five of six LASSI subscales: Anxiety (p = .016), Information Processing (p = .010), Selecting Main Ideas (p = .010), Self-Testing (p = .003), and Motivation (p < .001). A four-item Strategy Adoption Scale demonstrated strong internal consistency (alpha = .833). Qualitative analysis yielded three themes: strategy integration, strategic motivation, and strategy transfer across contexts. Discussion/Implications Gains across both skill and will domains suggest that a theoretically grounded, learning specialist-delivered intervention engages the full SRL cycle. These findings suggest that structured, theoretically grounded learning support is a critically underutilized component of premedical pathway programming.

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