Launched in November 2007, the Global Alliance for Pre-Service Education (GAPS) is an online Community of Practice supported by the Capacity Project in collaboration with the World Health Organization and the IBP Consortium. This global initiative is aimed at strengthening pre-service education in family planning and reproductive health in low-resource settings. Moderated by the Capacity Project team, the GAPS website (http://my.ibpinitiative.org/gap) contains educational and clinical resources and serves as a forum for guided community discussions.

There are now over 200 members. Since the launch, the team completed two fora and shared a summary of discussions from the first forum (“Core competencies: the gap between theory and practice”). The third forum began on March 31 and invites participants to analyze the challenges and best practices associated with competency-based education. Those interested in joining GAPS can visit http://my.ibpinitiative.org/public/gap/.

April 2008