Best Practices for Aligning Education with Clinical Skills Training

By: Jenn Hall | June 2025

Many healthcare roles require both classroom learning – whether in person or virtual – and live clinical skills training to ensure a high level of competence, improved safety and compliance, and increased individual and team confidence. Physicians, nurses, medical assistants, and dental assistants are just a few of the many roles that depend on these two modes of training throughout their careers.

Effective knowledge and skills development requires proper alignment between theoretical knowledge and real-world practice. And to gain that alignment, we recommend the following best practices.

Conduct a skills assessment

Before you can even begin to align your clinical skills training with a role-relevant education program, you must conduct an organizational skills assessment to identify current and anticipated skills gaps. During this assessment, you may ask the following questions:

What skills do we need to handle our current patient population and/or operations?
What skills do we anticipate needing for the future?
Which skills do we currently have with existing team members? And at what level are those skills?
What are the current industry standards for skills needed by role?
Which industry certifications do our team members currently hold?
How can we address the skills gaps identified?

Reviewing your current and future skills needs is a great way to manage your workforce and prepare for the future. As such, it’s important to conduct these assessments on a regular basis (e.g., annually).

[Medical assistant skills gap assessment template]

Select professional development program

Once you have identified the necessary skills to meet the existing and evolving needs of your healthcare organization, the next step is to address those needs through professional development. There are several options for professional development, including

Formal training (e.g., certificate or degree programs)
Workshops
Job shadowing or rotation
Mentoring
Certification

Professional Development options Pros and cons

For the purposes of this discussion, we will focus on formal training and certification.

Formal education can provide a structured and focused set of learning objectives, leading your team members to a specific goal. For example, if a team member could benefit from reskilling as a medical assistant, you could enroll them in a medical assistant training program. The result of this program would be reinforced skills needed to successfully practice as a medical assistant, as well as preparation for industry certification – both of which will benefit the individual and your entire organization.

Clinical skills training

Certain healthcare roles will require clinical or live skills training to ensure optimal competence in their daily tasks and interactions with patients. For example, phlebotomists should expect to have both conceptual learning as well as focused skills training that includes both practice time with an artificial arm and hands-on experience with live individuals.

Although there is no location or educational delivery format requirement for conceptual learning or lab-based skills training, there is no replacement for the experience students receive when working directly with patients. This experience is gained through live clinical skills training, which can be acquired through on-the-job training within your organization, an educational provider, an externship, or another partnership. These clinical skills may include vital sign measurement, medication administration, blood work techniques, injections, patient preparation, and more.

Benefits of aligning didactic learning with clinical skills training

Integrating didactic learning with clinical skills training enables your team to create a more cohesive, practical, and workforce-aligned learning experience that bridges the gap between theory and real-world application.

benefits of aligning education with clinical skills training

U.S. Career Institute partners with organizations to deliver high-quality, 100% online, self-paced, and DEAC accredited healthcare education, including 18 healthcare programs. Our partnership with ConvenientMD, the leading urgent care provider in New England, enabled their team to effectively integrate online training with live skills training to develop competent and confident medical assistants. ConvenientMD is now able to monitor progress and adapt live skills training to reinforce the information employees gain through the online content from U.S. Career Institute. As a result of this partnership, ConvenientMD has developed a strong team of nationally certified and properly trained medical assistants who received 100% on the Certified Clinical Medical Assistant (CCMA) exam (compared to the national average of 77%). They continue to develop their medical assistant workforce to fill critical roles within their urgent care facilities.

According to research outlined in The Effects of Online Continuing Education for Healthcare Professionals: A Systematic Scoping Review, published in the Open Education Studies Journal in 2024, “The benefits brought by online CPD [continuing professional development] training for caregivers were found in knowledge, performance, skills, attitude, confidence, satisfaction, and self-efficacy levels.” At U.S. Career Institute, we believe that everyone deserves greater access to high quality education and that a blended approach that includes online learning with skills training will help your organization build a competent, confident, and compassionate workforce.

Professional development comparison, by program type and format

Type	Typical Duration	Format (All Types)
Certificate	Less than a year	100% online
Associate degree	2 years	100% online and self-paced
Bachelor's degree	4 years	100% in person Hybrid

Certificate

Typical Duration: Less than a year

Format: 100% online

Associate degree

Typical Duration: 2 years

Format:100% online and self-paced

Bachelor's degree

Typical Duration: 4 years

Format: 100% in person, Hybrid

Generally, a certificate program will be your least expensive option, with degrees increasing in expense the longer an individual is in school. The specific training program (e.g., medical assistant, pharmacy technician) will also play a role in the total program expense as some programs will require more courses, deeper technical or scientific education, or more specialized skills training than others.

Beyond tuition and fees, there are additional costs that must be factored into the total cost of professional development. For example, if you require your team members to participate in an in-person or hybrid program, you must factor in the cost for transportation, parking, and time away from work or family. Conversely, online programs can reduce some of the extraneous costs, while delivering the same educational benefits.

Choose an education partner

There are several factors to consider when selecting an education partner to support your team’s professional development, including:

Programs offered: Does this educational partner offer the programs that would benefit our team?
Program format: Will our team members need to attend classes on-site at a set time or will they learn online with a more flexible, self-paced option?
Program type: Will our team members earn a certificate or degree?
Program cost: What is the total cost of each program?
Certification preparation: Will the program(s) prepare our team to pursue or maintain industry certification? Will this partner offer any financial support for individual certification exams or test preparation?
Customization options: Will we be able to customize our team’s learning path to align with our specific needs? Will we be able to effectively align the education program with our clinical skills training?
Monitoring capabilities: How will we monitor the progress of our team members who are actively involved in an educational program?

When looking at U.S. Career Institute as a potential education partner:

USCI programs: We offer 18 healthcare programs, as well as additional programs in areas such as business, service, wellness, skilled trades, and more.
USCI program format: 100% online, self-paced education. Some programs also include additional hands-on-skills training.
USCI program type: We offer certificate and associate degree programs.
USCI program costs: We offer affordable tuition with digital learning materials included. Exact tuition costs will vary depending on the program; typically certificate programs are less than $2,000 and associate degrees around $8,000.
USCI certification preparation: Many of our healthcare programs prepare students to pursue industry certification. For example, our medical assistant certificate program prepares students to take the certified clinical medical assistant (CCMA) certification exam. The CCMA exam and preparation fees are included with the tuition. Our graduates pass national certification exams at a higher rate than the national average.
USCI program customization options: We work directly with our clients to customize their team’s learning path to ensure their learning directly aligns with their unique needs.
USCI monitoring capabilities: We provide custom-built reporting that enables you to measure student achievement, evaluate outcomes, and easily share performance with your stakeholders in real-time.

Next steps

Continuous professional development is an important component of a healthy, happy, and competent healthcare system. First, conduct a skills assessment to identify your current and anticipated roles and associated skills within your organization. Be sure to consider natural attrition due to retirement as well as potential turnover.

With this knowledge, you will be in a great position to seek out professional development opportunities that align with your organization’s needs. Some roles will require additional live skills training, so it’s important to partner with an education provider who will work with your organization to align the two learning modalities.

Could U.S. Career Institute be the right education partner for your team? Reach out to one of our partner representatives to discuss your needs and how USCI can help your team level up in their knowledge and skills.