Nurse Educator Tips for Teaching

Although clinical compliance requirements are similar for each hospital, each institution requires students to complete their education materials, resulting in unnecessary repetitive training and time lost gaining valuable clinical experience. Academic and hospital leaders in Maryland implemented a statewide, standardized prelicensure nursing compliance program accessed by nursing programs through a repository for students to complete before their first clinical experience and then annually. This ensures consistent learning and reduces inefficiencies by streamlining compliance processes and operations, resulting in saving time and resources. In this podcast and article, Drs. Crystal DeVance-Wilson, Jennifer Zipp, and Matt Rietschel describe their Universal Onboarding processes and challenges, and share advise with listeners.

How do students learn physical assessments most effectively and transfer these skills to clinical practice? Traditionally, students learn to conduct a complete assessment over several weeks and demonstrate their competence by performing assessments under the observation of a faculty member. However, this standard approach may result in students merely memorizing the steps to pass the assessment, potentially leading to difficulties in transferring these skills to real clinical situations. To address this issue, the faculty implemented a video technology method, allowing students to record themselves while assessing a peer partner. Using Swivel® technology (https://www.swivl.com), students capture their assessments on video and complete a self-evaluation before submitting their videos for grading. In the podcast and article, Dr. Delanie explains the teaching strategy.

Dr. Logan Camp-Spivey describes a simulation they developed that focuses on care of a transgender patient in an emergency situation. The simulation was created to address gaps in nursing students' exposure to transgender patient care and provide practice for students in responding to a code. As part of the simulation, students review the medical records, assess the patient, and respond to a code situation that requires CPR. The feedback from students has been overwhelmingly positive. Learn more about the simulation in their article.

The school of nursing and affiliated medical center partnered to align the Nurse Residency Program with an undergraduate elective course in nursing leadership. This enabled associate degree nurses (ADN) to earn academic credit (3 credits) when they matriculate into the school's RN to BSN program. Dr. Hallowell explains in the podcast and article that this initiative is designed to acknowledge the educational merit of structured transition-to-practice programs, encouraging academic advancement among ADN-prepared nurses. By granting academic credit for experiential learning, the model reduces redundancy, fosters leadership development, and supports lifelong learning.

The need to better prepare nursing graduates with essential competencies for beginning practice led to the creation of a unique nursing program that uses an apprenticeship model. In this program, second-degree students are paired with a nurse mentor who serves as their clinical educator for the length of the program. The health care systems employ students as nurse apprentices, provide wages and benefits, and are responsible for their tuition, books, and fees. In this podcast and article, the authors describe the program and curriculum, and share outcomes for students, the school, and the participating health care systems.

Graduate education in nursing presents challenges and opportunities for growth. Dr. Gray shares her qualitative study on the experiences of nurses during their first semester of graduate school. Reflections of 23 students were analyzed by nursing faculty using qualitative descriptive methods. Five main concepts were identified by students: academic performance, challenges, emotions, linking coursework to future role, and support.

This podcast with Drs. Bethany Gilbert and Kimberly Budisalich explores how focused simulation enhances nurse practitioner competence in clinical case presentations. The authors discuss designing realistic scenarios, providing structured feedback, and using deliberate practice to improve clarity, diagnostic reasoning, and interprofessional communication. Outcomes include increased confidence, improved presentation structure, and better readiness for real-world patient care settings.

Dr. Lydia Lau, Deputy Head, describes the undergraduate curriculum at Alice Lee Centre for Nursing Studies, National University of Singapore (NUS). In this podcast, she walks us through the prelicensure curriculum, which is based on Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs). All of the nursing programs in Singapore now use these EPAs. Faculty use case based learning and have intentionally integrated modules in the curriculum to build students' resilience and promote their self-care.

Alcohol use is common worldwide. Faculty constructed a learning experience for students at a Latino Festival to help them and festivalgoers understand the differences in alcohol content in a variety of Mexican beers. The learning experience engaged students and community members in a fun activity to help them develop an awareness that "Not all beer is equal," with an overarching theme of the impact of alcohol use and misuse and of making wise decisions when consuming alcohol. This podcast with Dr. Sooksai Kaewbua (and article) discusses how the engaging activity was planned, conducted, and evaluated.

Podcasts are a popular educational tool that can be used to deliver content in asynchronous online education. Creating the content and accompanying learning activities, however, can be time consuming for faculty. Dr. Becky Carson has an innovative podcast, The Peds NP, that delivers content via microlearning podcasts on focused topics. She discusses a project she completed with colleagues to demonstrate that this podcast series can be used in a flipped classroom paired with learner-centric activities to address curricular gaps and deliver graduate nursing competency-based education. If interested in developing educational podcasts, be sure to access evidence- based standards to guide podcast production.