In the world of nursing education, instructional videos often serve a singular purpose: preparing students for board exams. While effective in delivering content, these videos can feel rigid and overly scripted. Julia McDougal Ronconi, a dedicated faculty member in the Nursing department, is determined to change that.
As a member of the Instructional Video Creators Network, Julia is on a mission to transform her lecture videos into dynamic learning tools that emphasize synthesis, application, and practice. With a budget of exactly $0, but a wealth of motivation, Julia is proving that innovation requires creativity and commitment.
From Theater to Teaching: Rediscovering Pacing
One of Julia’s first realizations was that her current videos move too quickly. Her speech cadence, she admits, isn’t ideal. But Julia has a unique advantage: her background in theater. In 7th and 8th grade, she learned to focus on speaking words and syllables, instead of sentences and paragraphs. Now, she’s bringing that same intentional pacing to her nursing videos to help students absorb and retain information more effectively.
Shorter, Smarter, and More Relevant
Julia is taking a strategic approach to updating content into a video format- one course at a time. Her goals are clear: make the videos shorter, refresh the content, and ensure each video aligns with current evidence-based practices in nursing education.
Open Source for a Broader Impact
Beyond her own classroom, Julia sees a larger opportunity. She’s passionate about creating open source instructional videos to address a significant gap in accessible, high-quality nursing education materials. While she’s starting with no funding, she’s exploring grant opportunities to support this vision and expand her reach.
Videos as a Springboard for Learning
For Julia, videos aren’t just passive content—they’re a springboard into active teaching. Her approach supports retrieval practice and dual coding, two evidence-based strategies that enhance learning by engaging both verbal and visual memory systems. Julia’s work is a powerful example of what’s possible when faculty reimagine their teaching tools. Through the Instructional Video Creators Network, she’s not just improving her own practice—she’s helping shape the future of nursing education.