PWS 24-Q-EDUC.pdf

PERFORMANCE WORK STATEMENT

For

On-Line Subscription Services US Army Graduate Program in Anesthesia Nursing

1. GENERAL: This is a non-personnel services contract to provide full access to web-based services and ongoing support to all current standard functionalities required by the US Army Graduate Program in Anesthesia Nursing (USAGPAN). The Government shall not exercise any supervision or control over the contract service providers performing the services herein. Such contract service providers shall be accountable solely to the Contractor who, in turn is responsible to the Government.

1.1. BACKGROUND: The US Army Graduate Program in Anesthesia Nursing (USAGPAN) consists of one Phase 1 Site located in San Antonio Texas and multiple geographically distant Phase 2 clinical sites. The Program Director, located at Phase 1, has oversight responsibility for ensuring the quality of the entire program. The program is accredited by the Council on Accreditation of Nurse Anesthesia Educational Programs (COA) and must meet the stringent record keeping requirements stipulated by the COA accreditation standards. The National Board of Certification and Recertification for Nurse Anesthesia (NBCRNA) utilizes a totally electronic documentation system. Subsequently, all transcript documents submitted by candidates for the national certification exam (NCE) must be in a standardized electronic format.

1.2. SCOPE OF WORK: The Contractor shall provide qualified personnel and web-based services necessary to support all fully operational functionalities required by USAGPAN. These functionalities must meet current electronic documentation requirements and include Student, Instructor, Course, and Program Evaluation tools, Case Tracking tools, Care Plans, Grades, Routine/Exam Failure/ Probation Counseling, Student Transcripts, Canvas or other affiliate online course integration, Student Credentialing data monitoring, and Student Demographic Data. The Contractor shall provide USAGPAN the ability to generate a variety of reports as needed on students, faculty, and the USAGPAN program IAW COA and USAGPAN program unique and specific requirements for program effectiveness evaluation. The web-based platform services must provide ready access to specific real-time data on active cohorts for the entire time they are in USAGPAN, as well as historic data necessary for queries/reports for the Program Director and any of the geographically distant Phase 2 sites as needed. The ability to access the web-based services via mobile application is preferred.

1.2.1. The Contractor shall comply with all applicable laws, rules and regulations, including but not limited to those included in Section 6 of the PWS.

1.2.2. All USAGPAN functionality requirements must be fully operational within two months of contract award.

1.3. SAFETY REQUIREMENTS: The Contractor shall maintain safety and health standards compliant with requirements of the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA).

1.4. SECURITY REQUIREMENTS: The Contractor shall be responsible for the security of all USAGPAN information. Recognition as a Texas Risk and Authorization Management Program (RAMP) and/or Federal RAMP certified entity is preferred. The FedRAMP empowers agencies to use modern cloud technologies, with an emphasis on security and protection of federal information.

1.4.1. The Contractor shall not disclose or cause to disseminate any information concerning operations of military activities. Such action(s) could result in violation of the contract and possible legal actions.

1.4.2. All inquiries, comments or complaints arising from any matter observed, experienced, or learned of as a result of or in connection with the performance of this contract, the resolution of which may require the dissemination of official information, shall be directed to the contracting officer representative (COR) and the contracting officer.

1.4.3. The Contractor shall only conduct business with designated government personnel listed as points of contact (POCs). Names of authorized personnel shall be provided to the Contractor by the government, in writing, and updated as necessary throughout the contract period.

1.4.4. U.S. Government records, copies of original results and reports, verified original data, corrected data, and corrected supporting final reports are maintained by the Contractor, but remain the property of the U.S.

Government. The rights to the data belong to the government. These files/results must be surrendered to the COR upon request. Should there be a change in vendor, data will be transferred in a secure fashion from one vendor to the next.

1.4.7. IDENTIFICATION OF PRIVACY ACT. This contract requires the development of a system of records in accordance with the Privacy Act of 1974.

1.5. PERFORMANCE QUALITY: The Contractor shall establish and maintain a complete Quality Assurance Surveillance Plan that shall ensure the requirements of the contract are provided as specified in Section 5 of the PWS. Within thirty calendar days after contract award, a comprehensive written QASP shall be submitted to the COR and within 5 working days when changes are made thereafter.

2. DEFINITIONS AND ACRONYMS:

2.1. DEFINITIONS:

2.1.1. CONTRACTOR. The term as used in this contract refers to the Vendor corporation.

2.1.2. CONTRACTING OFFICER. A person with authority to enter into, administer, or terminate contracts, and make related determinations and findings on behalf of the government. Note: The only individual who can legally bind the government.

2.1.3. CONTRACTING OFFICER'S REPRESENTATIVE (COR). An employee of the U.S. Government appointed by the contracting officer to administer the contract. Such appointment shall be in writing and shall state the scope of authority and limitations. This individual has authority to provide technical direction to the Contractor as long as that direction is within the scope of the contract, does not constitute a change, and has no funding implications. This individual does NOT have authority to change the terms and conditions of the contract.

2.1.4. PHYSICAL SECURITY. Actions that prevent the loss or damage of government property.

2.1.5. QUALITY ASSURANCE. The government procedures to verify that services being performed by the Contractor are performed according to acceptable standards.

2.1.6. QUALITY CONTROL. All necessary measures taken by the Contractor to assure that the quality of an end product or service shall meet contract requirements.

2.2. ACRONYMS:

AR Army Regulation CFR Code of Federal Regulations CLIN Contract Line Item Number COR Contracting Officer Representative DA Department of the Army DD250 Department of Defense Form 250 (Receiving Report) DHA Defense Health Agency

DOD Department of Defense KO Contracting Officer (the only person that can obligate the government and approve modifications to the contract) MEDCoE U.S. Army Medical Center of Excellence MEDCOM U.S. Army Medical Command MTF Medical Treatment Facility OTSG Office of The Surgeon General, U.S. Army POC Point of Contact PBWS Performance Based Work Statement QAP Quality Assurance Plan QA&I Quality Assurance and Improvement QC Quality Control TRADOC U.S. Army Training and Doctrine Command

3. GOVERNMENT FURNISHED ITEMS AND SERVICES:

3.1. The Government will provide necessary information for the Contractor to establish accounts and access for students, faculty, and clinical instructors (ex. name, location, role, and e-mail address).

3.2. The Government will notify the Contractor of any changes in status of students, faculty, and clinical instructors.

3.3. The Government will provide a list of the program sites where access to the web-based services is required.

3.4. The Government will provide dates for annual on-site or virtual training and security gate access for the Contractor to provide the on-site training, if applicable.

3.5. The Government will notify the Contractor of any updates/changes in Contractor service requirements (ex.

access, tools, reports) in response to changing USAGPAN and COA accreditation requirements.

3.6 The Government will provide a program evaluation calendar for reference.

3.7. The Government will be responsible for all functions necessary to register students for courses through the affiliate university. The Government will be responsible for entering course grades in the USAGPAN grades template provided by the Contractor and then transferring course grades from USAGPAN to the affiliate university.

4. CONTRACTOR FURNISHED ITEMS AND RESPONSIBILITIES: The Contractor shall furnish all services required to perform work under this contract.

4.1. PERSONNEL QUALIFICATIONS. The Contractor shall provide qualified personnel to respond to USAGPAN requirements. Contractor personnel shall provide technical support for USAGPAN users with access to and update/ changes to existing capabilities as needed.

4.2. MATERIALS. The Contractor shall furnish teaching /reference materials for annual on-site training and as needed upon request by the USAGPAN.

5. DESCRIPTION OF WORK: The Contractor must have experience in supporting higher education nursing anesthesia program requirements. The Contractor shall provide web-based functionalities with technical support as follows:

5.1 Developing and Maintaining Program Evaluation tools - Student, Instructor, Course, and Program Evaluation tools – Ready access to these established standard tools is necessary to provide information on student, faculty, and program performance in accordance with COA accreditation requirements. The

Contractor must be capable of generating evaluation tool question formats to include Matrix/Likert Scale, Rating Scale, Visual Analog Scale Score, and Open Ended/Fill In/ Dialog Box. Program evaluation tools must be available to USAGPAN on a regular basis as per program evaluation calendar below as well as on an as needed basis.

Crse = Course

PRN = As Needed

5.2 Student Case tracking – Case tracking is a required functionality to provide detailed accounting of all anesthetics performed by students. Students must be able to enter case information via web access.

Documentation of experiences in the following categories is required for COA accreditation and by the NBCRNA for a candidate to qualify to take the certification exam:

Critique Format Jan Feb March April May June July August Sept Oct Nov Dec

Student Entry Survey Medatrax X

Didactic Instructor Critique Medatrax 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse

Course Critique Medatrax 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse

Critique of Simulation by Student Medatrax X X

Peer Review (Faculty) MEDCoE PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN

Group Project Peer Evaluation Medatrax

Student Phase 1 Critique Medatrax X

Critique of Phase 1 by Faculty Medatrax X

Phase 1 Critique by Phase 2 Medatrax X

Daily Clinical Evaluation Medatrax X

Term Evaluation Medatrax Term 4 Term 2 Term 3 Term 1

Term Student Self Evaluation Medatrax Term 4 Term 2 Term 3 Term 1

Clinical Instructor Critique Medatrax X X X X

Phase 2 Critique by Students Medatrax X

Phase 2 Critique by Faculty Medatrax X

Affil iate Site Survey Medatrax X

On-Line Course Evaluation Medatrax 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse 1X/Crse

Student Exit Survey Medatrax PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN PRN

Phase 1 Critique by Phase 2 - used to evaluate students shortly after they transition to Phase 2, providing feedback to Phase 1 on their effectiveness in preparing students for Phase 2. Performed by the PD, APD, and SCI on an annual basis.

Student Entry Survey - administered during the first week of the program, it is used to ascertain why students chose the program, what are their expectations, and what are their concerns.

Didactic Instructor Critique - used to evaluate instructor effectiveness. Performed by students on permanent faculty at the end of a course. Also performed by students on guest lecturers with each period of instruction provided.

Course Critique - used to evaluate the effectiveness of the course in providing content that is relevant to the whole program. Performed by students at the end of a course.

Student Phase 1 Critique - used to evaluate the effectiveness of the entire Phase 1 and performed by students at the end of Phase 1.

Critique of Phase 1 by Faculty - used to solicit feedback from Faculty on the effectiveness of the entire Phase 1 content. Performed by Phase 1 Faculty at the end of Phase 1.

Critique of Simulation by Student - used to evaluate the effectiveness of simuation in preparing students for cl inical setting. Performed by students at end of each simulation course Peer Review (Faculty) used to assist new instructors with content delivery effectiveness and recommend areas for improvement

Group Project Peer Evaluation used to evaluate the contributions of group members in group work. Performed by group members on each other and reviewed by project faculty member

Affi l iate Site Survey - used to evaluate effectiveness of affil iate rotations. Performed by students after each affi liate site rotation.

Student Exit Survey - used to elicit feedback on the process and experience of any student who withdraws or is relieved from the program. Performed by a student who undergoes withdraw or relief procedures.

Daily Clinical Evaluation - used to evaluate and provide documented feedback on individual student performance each cl inical day. Performed by any cl inical instructor to whom the student is assigned.Term Evaluation - used to evaluate and provide documented feedback on individual student performance over the course of a term. Performed by the Primary Phase 2 faculty on every student at the end of each term.Term Student Self Evaluation - used to provide feedback on student performance during the term as assessed by the students themselves. Performed by the students at the end of each term.

Clinical Instructor Critique - used to evaluate and provide documented feedback on individual cl inical instructor performance. Performed by the students on a quarterly basis. Phase 2 Critique by Students - used to evaluate overall effectiveness of Phase 2 from the student perspective. Performed by the students at the end of Phase 2.

Phase 2 Critique by Faculty - used to evaluate overall effectiveness of Phase 2 from the Phase 2 Faculty perspective. Performed by the PD, APD, and SCI on an annual basis.

On-Line Course Evaluation - used to evaluate the effectiveness of courses delivered via distance learning. Performed by students at the end of course

Total Number of Anesthesia Cases (documented in numbers and anesthesia class) Total Hours of Clinical time and Anesthesia time Instructor category Patient Assessments Specialty Cases Position categories Anatomical categories Pharmacologic agents Methods of anesthesia Arterial techniques Central Venous Pressure catheter Pulmonary Artery catheter Ultrasound Guided techniques Committed time

Documentation of this information is required as part of the record of clinical experience. It is essential that the student case tracking information also populates the student transcripts.

5.3 Transcripts – Transcripts provide documentation of academic course hours and student clinical experiences, demonstrating that the student is eligible to take the national certification exam. Transcripts must be in a standardized format that can be uploaded by individual or cohort into the NBCRNA website.

5.4 Care plans - The Care plans provide the mechanism by which clinical faculty evaluate a student’s care of the patient during the anesthetic. Students must have ready access to a USAGPAN program specific Care Plan platform to enter patient data.

5.5 Grading Package - The USAGPAN requires a grading platform for data entry on all graded events for each student in an accurate manner. This is a requirement for USAGPAN, MEDCoE, and the affiliate university to confer the doctoral degree. The grading package must include capability for course grade entry, graded event weighting, and calculation of the grade point average. The USAGPAN requires both numeric and letter grade reporting. Exam failure and probation notification and counseling templates are requisite components of this package. The ability to change graded events (name, number, weight of each event) is imperative in order to keep current with USAGPAN curriculum and university course requirements.

5.6 Routine and Threshold Counseling – Compliance with TRADOC and COA standards requires that students are counseled on a routine basis. The USAGPAN must have the ability to create and manage the assignment of students to faculty members for counseling. If the assigned faculty member is away, the program must be able to temporarily assign the students to other faculty members in order to ensure ongoing student support. Faculty members must have access to web-based routine counseling templates that allow faculty and student login in person or remotely to document counseling events. Currently, USAGPAN policy is that routine counseling takes place on a monthly basis. In addition to routine counseling, faculty members must have access to web-based and mobile threshold/event counseling to address student issues not otherwise covered by routine counseling. This data is maintained as part of the student record for the entire program.

Should there be a contentious event resulting in the dismissal of a student, that student’s records are kept by USAGPAN indefinitely.

5.7 Demographics Data –Student name, address, e-mail address, phone number, AANA number, GRE scores, undergraduate degree/ undergraduate degree grade point average, years of nursing experience, nursing license number, state, and expiration date, military information (direct accession, active duty, rank, date of rank), and next of kin are all vital pieces of information that are a part of USAGPAN documentation requirements.

Additional demographic data tracked by USAGPAN include self-evaluation exam (SEE) scores and NCE scores used for comparison between Phase 2 sites, between cohorts, and against the national average scores.

IAW COA standards the USAGPAN must record and publish outcome measures to include student attrition, NCE pass rates, and mean scores per cohort. IAW MEDCoE 351-12, the USAGPAN must keep documentation of students who attrit and be able to differentiate between academic and non-academic attrition.

Demographic data serve as a foundation for command directed data calls. As the information is sensitive in nature, security of the data is imperative.

5.8 Reports – The USAGPAN requires the ability to query and generate a variety of reports regarding students, faculty, clinical instructors, and any of the program locations, on an as needed basis. The USAGPAN requires the ability to extrapolate data from one report to generate other reports. The Contractor must provide active data retrieval as well as data retrieval from historic and archived documents. The USAGPAN must be able to perform the following comparative analysis reports:

Comparison of individual student performance across time Comparison of students within the same cohort at the same site Comparison of students in different cohorts at the same site Comparison of students within the same cohort at different sites Comparison of students in different cohorts at different sites

5.9 Faculty and Student Accounts – Faculty members require access to web-based services on three levels.

The Program Director (PD), Deputy Program Director (DPD), and Senior Quality Assurance Specialist (SQAS) require access to all capabilities of the web-based service at the master administrator level. The Phase 1 and Phase 2 primary faculty members require access to web-based services at the administrator level. The clinical adjunct faculty members/clinical instructors require instructor level access to the web-based services.

Students require student level of access to the web-based services. The Contractor shall activate/deactivate accounts based on guidance from USAGPAN faculty regarding requirements for current Faculty and Students.

5.10 Customer Service/Technical Support -The Contractor must provide customer service/technical support to the faculty and students.

Customer Service/Technical Support includes:

5.10.1 Technical support to users via telephone, chat, text and/or e-mail during normal duty hours (0800-1700 M-F) regardless of time zone (i.e. Tripler Army Medical Center, Hawaii, HST). Provide emergency point of contact on as needed basis.

5.10.2 Response time of two hours or less to any request for customer service/technical support.

5.10.3 Custom updates to existing tools and platform capabilities in keeping with changing COA and USAGPAN program requirements. Updates to existing tools and platform capabilities as a result of changing COA and/or USAGPAN requirements will be performed at no cost to the government.

5.10.4 Annual on-site or virtual training for use of software and navigation through web functionalities (demographics, evaluations, case tracking, care plans, etc.)

6. APPLICABLE REGULATIONS AND MANUALS:

6.1 AR 40-68, Feb 04, Quality Assurance Administration

Web-Based Service Access

Student Evaluation Tool

Instructor Evaluation Tool

Course Evaluation Tool

Program Evaluation tools

Case Tracking Transcripts Care Plans Grades Counseling Demographics Reports

PD, DPD, SQAS

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Master Administrator

Phase 1 Faculty Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator

Phase 2 Faculty Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Administrator Clinical Instructors Instructor

Students Student Student Student Student Student Student Student Student Student Student

6.2 Council on Accreditation of Nurse Anesthesia Educational Programs Accreditation Policies and Procedures, May 2022

6.3 Council on Accreditation of Nurse Anesthesia Educational Programs Standards for Accreditation of Nurse Anesthesia Educational Programs Practice Doctorate, May 2022

7. QUALITY ASSURANCE SURVEILLANCE PLAN AND PERFORMANCE REQUIREMENTS

SUMMARY

A. OBJECTIVE: This plan provides a quality surveillance strategy for access to the web-based services.

The primary purpose of this plan is to provide a basis for the government’s evaluation of the Contractor’s key areas of performance under this contract. The Administrative Contracting Officer, in conjunction with input provided by the Contracting Officer’s Representative, will evaluate the Contractor’s performance. Oversight of the Contractor’s performance will assure quality and consistency of contract performance.

B. PERFORMANCE MEASUREMENT OBJECTIVE: The key area(s) of the Contractor’s performance that will be evaluated during the term of the contract. The statement of work reference will be provided for each performance measurement objective.

C. ACCEPTABLE QUALITY LEVEL (AQL): The degree to which the Government will allow the Contractor’s key areas of performance to vary; the variance from the standard that the Contractor is allowed and the grading/measurement associated with deviation from the specific performance standard.

D. KEY AREAS OF PERFORMANCE (PERFORMANCE REQUIREMENTS SUMMARY):

1. Access to Web-based Tools

a. Objective: Provide access to the following web-based tools: Evaluations, Case tracking, Transcripts, Care Plans, and Demographics, pages.

b. Standard: IAW the Performance Work Statement paragraph 1.2. and 5.1, 5.2, 5.3, 5.4, and 5.7.

c. Assessment Method: Monitor availability of web-based tools as reported by Program Director, Phase 1 Faculty members, Phase 2 Directors, and students.

d. AQL: In order to be in compliance with Council on Accreditation of Nurse Anesthesia Educational Program standards, these tools must be available 95% or more during the period of performance.

(1) Satisfactory: 95% availability

(2) Marginal: 80% availability

(3) Unsatisfactory: <80 availability

2. Access to Grades Platform

a. Objective: Provide access to grading platform for data entry on current classes and data retrieval on previous classes. Provide ongoing calculation of student grade point average and exam failure status. Provide availability to failure/probation counseling capabilities.

b. Standard: IAW the Performance Work Statement paragraph 1.2 and 5.5

c. Assessment Method: Monitor availability for grades entry and retrieval on as needed basis.

Monitor availability to failure/probation documentation template on as needed basis

d. AQL: Grades database must be available for data entry and retrieval 100% during period of performance

(1) Satisfactory: 100% availability

(3) Unsatisfactory: <80% availability

3. Routine and Threshold Counseling

a. Objective: Provide ability to assign students to faculty members and generate routine and threshold counseling documentation IAW TRADOC and COA requirements.

b. Standard: IAW the Performance Work Statement paragraph 1.2 and 5.6

c. Assessment Method: Monitor ability to manage students/counselors and availability of routine and threshold counseling templates.

d. AQL: Routine Counseling and Threshold Counseling templates must be available for data entry and retrieval 100% during period of performance

(1) Satisfactory: 100% availability

(3) Unsatisfactory: <80% availability

4. Generate Reports

a. Objective: Provide ability to query and generate reports as needed by USAGPAN

b. Standard: IAW Performance Work Statement paragraph 1.2 and 5.8

c. Assessment Method: Monitor ability to request data for reports and generate those reports as needed

d. AQL: USAGPAN must be able to generate reports quickly as needed 95% during period of performance

(1) Satisfactory: 95%

(2) Marginal: 80%

(3) Unsatisfactory: <80%

4 Provide Customer Service/Technical Support

a. Objective: Provide user customer service/technical support in person or via e-mail or phone in a timely manner

b. Standard: IAW Performance Work Statement paragraph 5.10

c. Assessment Method: Monitor student and faculty reports of customer service/technical support provided by contractor

d. AQL: Requests for customer service/technical support will be processed/answered in two hours or less 95% during period of performance

(1) Satisfactory: 95%

5 Provide Customizable Edits/Updates

a. Objective: Provide user ability to make custom edits/updates to existing tools and platform capabilities in keeping with changing COA and USAGPAN program requirements.

b. Standard: IAW Performance Work Statement paragraph 5.10.3

c. Assessment Method: Monitor program faculty reports of support for making custom edits/updates provided by contractor

d. AQL: Requests for custom edits/updates support will be performed as requested 95% during period of performance

(1) Satisfactory: 95%