Core Competencies of Nurse Educators

Whats Nursing Educator Competencies

    The list of core competencies developed by think tank participants
was given to a Task Group on Nurse Educator Competencies, which operated under
the guidance of NLN’s Nursing Education Workforce Development Advisory Council.
This group of nurse educators conducted an extensive search of the literature
to determine if the eight competencies identified by the think tank
participants were documented in evidence based literature, or if there was a
need to modify them. 

    They worked for 2 years on this task and disseminated
their work to the broad nurse educator community for comment. Based on this
feedback, the task group refined the competencies and produced a manuscript,
currently in press, that documents core competencies from the literature,
identifies gaps in the literature, and proposes research questions that need to
be addressed.

    The Core Competencies of Nurse Educators (NLN, 2005a) have been
incorporated into the Scope of Practice for Academic Nurse Educators (NLN,
2005d), and are already being used to provide direction for the development of
graduate programs that prepare nurse educators. They provide a framework of
essential knowledge, skills, and attitudes relevant to the educator role. 

    In
addition, they formed the basis for the development of the first and only
certification program for academic nurse educators by providing the foundation
for the items that were included in the practice analysis, an essential first
step in the creation of a certification examination.

Teaching/Learning Strategies

    Teaching/learning strategies are the processes that are used for
the actual delivery of the curriculum. The following list describes some
principles that should be considered when choosing teaching/learning
strategies. Teaching/learning strategies should.

    Clearly relate to the desired objectives and competencies, learning
domain, and domain level.

Motivation for Competency

    Learning begins only when the learner is motivated to learn the
material (Leamnson, 1999). Wlodkowski  (1978, p. 12) proposed that motivation refers to following processes: 

(a) arouse and instigate behavior

(b) give direction and
purpose to behavior

(c) continue to allow behavior to persist

(d) lead to
choosing or professing a particular behavior 

    Motivation is
concerned with the will or desire of the student to put forth the effort to
learn (Davis, 1993). To become motivated to learn, the learner must experience
it as a need or feel a desire to know. Thus, learning can be effective if it
satisfies a curiosity or natural interest. 

    Faculty members need to capitalize
on broad categories of motivators, such as individual improvement, needed
employment competencies, or acquisition of a degree or certification
requirements to influence or stimulate the student’s motivation to learn
(Greive, 2002).

Teaching Responsibility for Nursing Educator

    Teaching responsibility can be described as teachers modeling and
actively lending assistance to help students achieve valuable prosocial
behaviors. Teaching content is always the primary focus of an instructor but
for a nursing student to go out into the world and work with others, he also
needs to know how to live and work with others and to apply what he has learned
in the university in his interactions with others. 

    Patricia Kyle and Lawrence
Rogien (2004) in Opportunities and Options in Classroom Management list the
following behaviors that instructors should actively teach and model to their
students.

    Dr. Goleman’s 1995 book, Emotional Intelligence, argues that human
competencies like self-awareness, self discipline, persistence, and empathy are
of greater consequence than intelligence quotient (IQ) in much of life, that we
ignore the decline in these competencies at our profile, and that teachers can
and should teach these abilities. According to Goleman, the five main
components of emotional intelligence are:

1. Self-awareness: knowing what you are feeling, and using your
awareness to make good decisions

2. Handling your emotions: keeping yourself in good spirits, coping
with anxiety, handling anger

3. Self-motivation: persistence and zeal; getting yourself started
and keeping yourself going, even in the face of setbacks and discouragement

4. Empathy: reading people’s feelings without them telling you

5. Social skills: handling your emotions in relationships

Present and Past of Nursing Education

    The current nursing education environment must provide a venue for
students to build and practice skill competencies. Earlier in the history of
nursing education, students learned by per forming skills on one another, a
practice that is no longer recommended. 

    Today these former “Skills Labs,” have
developed into actual Learning Resource Centers (LRCs), whose function is
limited only by the creativity of the faculty who use them. This chapter will
focus on LRCs, and the role of the faculty in their creation, maintenance, and
use.

Skill Competencies

    The primary reasons that LRCs exist are for nursing students to
have a setting where they can develop and master proficiency in the
implementation of client care. Whether isolated, or combined in a scenario,
there needs to be a decision as to specifics regarding skill competencies.
Skill competencies are a listing of all the required skills or procedures that
a student needs to acquire over the course of his education. The skills may be
listed in a variety of ways: 

(1) in alphabetical order

(2) by course
requirements

(3) by level of student (sophomore to senior)

Element of Skill Competencies

    A variety of
elements are required to be completed for the student to pass the skill
competencies successfully. Those creating the LRC need to decide which skill
competencies will be developed in the LRC, how they will be developed, and
which skills competencies will be considered necessary to include for
proficient performance of a particular skill. 

    A curriculum committee meeting is
an ideal place for this planning process to begin, as skill competencies cross
the curriculum, and all courses and learning objectives need to be considered.
The curriculum committee, considering the objectives of the program, then
decides what portion of the program requires LRC components, and which skills,
and skill competencies, need to be included in each course. 

    Once it has been
determined which competencies need to be introduced, the committee determines
which skills need to be mastered. These can be detailed in a Competencies
Master Plan. Not all skills involve intense instruction and time investment to
achieve mastery. The LRC can be used to focus on those skills that are best
learned and mastered in that environment. 

    For example, therapeutic
communication techniques can be introduced and practiced in an LRC setting,
particularly if there is emphasis on using these techniques in interactions
with clients in health-care settings, but they can be just as easily introduced
and mastered in a setting other than the LRC. 

    Time constraints also guide which
competencies need to be mastered in the laboratory session, as the time spent
in the LRC competes with student time spent in theory-building activities, as
well as in the clinical setting. After the faculty has made a decision about
which competencies will be introduced and more tered in the LRC setting,
planning on how best to implement the process begins. 

    Instructors should
carefully outline the specific objectives that are to be met in each laboratory
session. Again, there should be a planning session in which this information is
decided by a dedicated group of people. A curriculum committee may be charged
with this task, or a task force set up for this purpose. Further decisions need
to be made about how the skills will be introduced, mastered, and evaluated. 

    Generally, it is necessary for each program to have internal consistency.
Policies regarding skill competencies need to be established throughout the
entire program. Every course does not need to be cookie-cutter identical, but
there does need to be congruency in what is presented in the LRC , and how it
will be evaluated throughout the program. 

    The activities that take place in the
LRC can vary greatly from course to course and program to program. Many
programs choose to introduce selected skills in a formal manner, with
identified objectives and skill checklists. 

    A nursing faculty member in the
course is assigned to present the content to the students, and the students
practice with supervision and guidance. This may be the extent to which some
skills are introduced, or there may be a requirement to complete a formal
testing process to determine competence to be mastered. 

    These can be detailed
in a Competencies Master Plan. Not all skills involve intense instruction and
time investment to achieve mastery. The LRC can be used to focus on those
skills that are best learned and mastered in that environment. 

    For example,
therapeutic communication techniques can be introduced and practiced in an LRC
setting, particularly if there is emphasis on using these techniques in
interactions with clients in health-care settings, but they can be just as
easily introduced and mastered in a setting other than the LRC. 

    Time
constraints also guide which competencies need to be mastered in the laboratory
session, as the time spent in the LRC competes with student time spent in
theory-building activities, as well as in the clinical setting. After the
faculty has made a decision about which competencies will be introduced and
more tered in the LRC setting, planning on how best to implement the process
begins.Read More