Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century for Nursing As A Career
Nursing As A Career: Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century
In the 21st century, nursing education faces significant challenges, including a shortage of nurse educators, limited resources, curriculum demands, and the need to adapt to evolving technologies and healthcare practices. These challenges impact the ability to prepare students for a dynamic and complex nursing profession, as well as the well-being and professional development of nurse educators themselves
Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century
One of the biggest challenges facing nursing educators today is the need to establish an independent evidence base in nursing education. Research in nursing education has been relatively devalued in terms of funding (Diekelmann & Ironside, 2002). Innovative studies that are conducted often consist of small samples and narrow settings, and often are not replicated.
As a result, there is little development of the science of nursing education. Compounding the funding issues, some doctoral programs in nursing have not officially recognized nursing education as a developing science, and limit doctoral dissertations to clinical practice areas. This prevents students from engaging in scholarly investigations in nursing education and limits the growth of the science of nursing education.
There have been many changes in nursing education in recent years. Changes in student populations, educational delivery methods, diversity in practice settings, technological advances in health care, and new modes of curriculum delivery have altered the landscape of nursing education (Ferguson & Day, 2005).
The challenge for nursing educators is to engage in research aimed at determining the effectiveness of nursing education. Without a science base underlying teaching, educators may be inclined to use more traditional approaches to teaching. Such approaches are based on past experiences and tradition. Fitzpatrick (2005) encourages nursing faculty “to put aside traditional tools of teaching and learning and to listen to students stories about how to make nursing education more meaningful to their lives as professional nurses” (p. 205).
How students learn, for example, is an area that merits careful examination. There has been much attention in nursing education on outcomes of learning, specifically critical thinking abilities. Nursing education has long recognized that curricula are content loaded and that the approach to education needs to change (Bevis & Watson, 1989; Peters, 2000).
As information continues to multiply exponentially, students are challenged to make use of efficient and effective means of learning. The learning process to date has been largely unexamined with teaching strategies implemented on unexamined assumptions about student learning (August-Brady, 2005). Research aimed at examining the process of learning may lead to more effective teaching practices and more capable nursing graduates.
A strong proponent for the science of nursing education, the National League for Nursing, advocates for the value of pedagogical research and the provision of financial resources for pedagogical research (NLN, 2005). Another challenge facing nursing education, as mentioned earlier, is the national shortage of faculty, a situation that is likely to worsen before it improves. The average age of a nursing professor with a doctoral degree is 56 years.
According to the National League for Nursing (Valiga, 2004) approximately 75% of the current nursing faculty population is expected to retire by 2015. Compared to other disciplines, it takes nursing faculty two times longer to complete graduate education culminating in a doctoral degree. This is primarily because nurses accrue several years in practice before pursuing graduate study, practice full-time, and often juggle multiple roles while attending graduate school.
Given that it currently takes approximately 16 years for nursing faculty to complete graduate education, the prospects of increasing faculty supply any time soon are not promising (Valiga, 2004). Because of this grim reality, new models for educating nursing faculty need consideration. Accelerated programs have started to appear, offering prospective faculty a fast track in graduate courses.
Care must be taken so that prospective faculty are offered courses in educational theory and are provided with immersion experiences in classroom and clinical instruction in order to prepare graduate students adequately for the teaching role. Recruitment and retention efforts currently directed towards the nursing shortage need to include recognition of the faculty shortage. State and federal monies are becoming more available for nurses who plan to pursue nursing education.
Although funding is needed to attract prospective faculty, additional efforts are needed to retain nursing faculty. In addition to common responsibilities shared by all faculty, the nursing faculty has additional responsibilities, including the expectation to maintain clinical practice expertise, clinical instruction of increasing numbers of students caring for highly acute and complex patients with accompanying responsibilities, and hours spent in developing positive collaborative relationships with clinical agencies.
An expectation to “do it all” adds an additional burden that does not seem to exist in other disciplines (Rudy, 2001). Such additional responsibilities need to be factored into the workload of nursing faculty and those responsibilities need to be recognized, valued, and compensated as they would be in a corporate environment. Individuals enter nursing education for a variety of reasons, including but not limited to, shaping the profession, being intellectually stimulated, and working in an autonomous role with an expected degree of flexibility.
According to data from the NLN (2004), individuals leave academe because of the heavy workload and poor salaries when compared with the corporate environment. Strong orientation programs are needed to assist in the development and retention of junior faculty members as they learn to navigate through academe. Senior faculty members may provide invaluable resources for junior faculty members in terms of informal or formal mentoring.
Continued professional development in nursing education is needed by most junior faculty members. Fortunately, many such opportunities exist in nursing in terms of conferences or more formal means. The Education Scholar Program endorsed by AACN is a Web-based program aimed at the promotion of teaching and professional scholarship primarily for educators in the health professions. The National League for Nursing offers a certification in nursing education, which formally recognizes the specialized knowledge of nursing educators.
Certification in nursing education, as in other areas of nursing practice, communicates to others that the highest standards of excellence are being met. There is a need for a serious national debate regarding credentialing in nursing education. In order to teach nursing in accredited nursing programs, one must have earned a master’s degree in nursing. Traditionally, nurses enter graduate programs after establishing themselves as practitioners, which results in nursing faculty entering academe much later when compared with other disciplines. This translates into fewer productive years as a teacher.
Concerned about the faculty shortage crisis, AACN (2003) questions whether a baccalaureate degree in nursing should be prerequisite to a master’s degree in nursing. It is conceivable that students with undergraduate degrees in disciplines other than nursing may offer a broader and potentially richer perspective to nursing. These are interesting, provocative questions and, in the absence of empirical evidence, worth serious deliberation.
Resources
Due to the recognized nursing faculty shortage, a variety of resources are now available for individuals interested in learning more about nursing education as a career. The American Nurses Association (ANA) has clearly articulated its vision of nursing education in the future and calls for the attraction of nursing faculty early in their careers.
Information about nursing education as a career may be found on a variety of nursing websites, including the American Nurses Association, the National League for Nursing, and the American Association of Colleges of Nursing. Professional nursing organizations such as the National League for Nursing have supported the movement to increase nursing education’s evidence base by developing Nursing Education Research Grants.
Through such grants, educators are encouraged to develop and test innovative models of education. Increasingly, monies are becoming available for nurses seeking to enter graduate education with the goal of pursuing a faculty role. Loan forgiveness programs are available that significantly reduce the cost of graduate study. Most loan forgiveness programs require that the recipient teach in an accredited school of nursing for a prescribed period of time. Scholarships are also available for prospective nursing faculty.
Conclusion
This topic highlighted some of the essential components of newly envisioned nursing education and some of the challenges that nursing education faces. This is a pivotal time to consider nursing. Nursing as a Career education as a career for several reasons. Nurse educators are challenged to use their creativity as they develop innovative models of education that are responsive to the current and future demands of a complex health-care environment.
Given that pedagogical research is beginning to be recognized and valued, nursing education would benefit from research related to teaching and learning, the design of flexible models of education, and the evaluation of related outcomes. The advancement of the science of nursing education presents yet another opportunity for nursing faculty members to forge their collective efforts in shaping the direction of professional nursing .
Nursing As A Career: Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century
Nursing As A Career: Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century
Nursing As A Career: Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century
Nursing As A Career: Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century
Nursing As A Career: Challenges for the Nurse Educator in the 21st Century
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