An evaluation of the Specialist Training Program (STP) which aims to improve the future specialist workforce by extending non-GP specialist medical training into regional, rural, remote and private healthcare settings. 

The STP, which commenced on 1 January 2010, provides registrars with exposure to a broader range of healthcare settings by extending vocational training for specialist registrars (trainees) into settings outside traditional metropolitan teaching hospitals, including regional, rural, remote and private facilities. The program is administered by 13 colleges, providing salary contribution funding for trainees and supervisors, along with financial support to training settings where training placements take place.

The evaluation provides an assessment of the appropriateness, effectiveness, implementation and efficiency of the STP to date and considers how the program could be improved (sustainability). 

This convergent mixed methods program evaluation draws together findings from across various data sources related to the STP and the overall context in which it operates. Individual results have been obtained from each data source against each key evaluation questions, and these have then been synthesised, with consideration for recurring themes, how results complemented and extended each other, and whether there were areas where they contradicted each other. 

To draw conclusions across the five domains of inquiry, a set of evaluative rubrics were then applied to determine the most appropriate interpretation of the data collected, and to explicitly demonstrate how this is weighted. 

The overall findings against the evaluation domains – Appropriateness, Effectiveness, Implementation, Efficiency and Sustainability – indicate that the program could be strengthened while it is valued in its contribution to providing training opportunities to the non-GP specialist workforce, the focus and responsiveness of the program could be improved.