Student Expectations of Nursing Education
Profiles of the researchers and authors of the report
The researchers and authors of this report are Dr David Saltmarsh, Ms Sue North and Dr Tony Koop. The work was conducted under the auspices of the School of Education in the Australian Centre for Educational Studies, a Division of Macquarie University.
Dr Saltmarsh has conducted a variety of academic and commercial research projects including evaluations into adult retraining programs, community employment services, teacher professional development and the provision of welfare services. He has had extensive experience in interview and focus group methodology and in the analysis of qualitative data.
Ms North is currently a doctoral student investigating instances of school related violence. She has considerable expertise in the focus group and interview methodology and in the analysis of interview texts.
Dr Koop's research interests are associated with the education of the professions, collaborative approaches to organisational change and development. He has a particular interest in the education of the professions. His research has focused on quality assurance and on the initial and continuing education of professionals.
Project overview
Project objectives
In reviewing nursing education it is valuable to explore both the expectations and the experiences of nursing education that participants are receiving. It is also important to consider how these experiences have shaped the plans students have for their employment in the future.
Most nurse education seems to be based on the assumption that the students who undertake nursing expect it to be a career for life, or that if nurses are currently unemployed, they are eager to return to active nursing work. However, if students have considered the effects of economic downturn (perhaps observing parents/others becoming unemployed) or the possibilities of a lifestyle that contains more than a single 'job for life', then they may be anticipating a more flexible future. If so, then the provision of nurse education may need to be different. This raises the following questions:
- Is nursing best considered as a single skill set for the purposes of providing education?
- What do students see their future careers being once they have completed training?
- What do students imagine they will be doing in 10 years time?
- How effective do students feel that nurse education is? (Ie, experiences of study, expectations of study, usefulness of the course, etc.)
- What lifestyle aspirations do nursing students have and how do they intend to negotiate these requirements?
- How do these views compare with the views of other staff in hospitals, employers and with other members of the profession?
Other issues to do with recruitment of students and provision of education should also be considered. Nursing, like education, serves a diverse set of interests.
- How can indigenous people, men and other under represented groups be recruited as students?
- What modes of teaching are most appropriate for the delivery of which components of the course?
These issues can be clarified by conducting a number of focus group interviews with current students and recent graduates.
Data and processes of analysis
The research that is proposed will investigate the above questions via a series of focus groups. Focus groups, according to Gibbs (1997), allow the researcher to gain access to 'attitudes, feelings, beliefs, experiences and reactions in a way that would not be feasible using other methods'. Patton (1990) has also noted the value of focus groups as a means of evaluating a program. Consequently, focus groups have been used extensively in educational research (see Denzin and Linclon 1994) and in allied health studies research (see Lewis 1995).
An investigation of student aspirations and expectations regarding their completion of a course is suited to a focus group approach and this proved to be particularly useful for providing information on how nursing identities were constructed. While a series of individual interviews would have yielded responses to a standard set of questions, the focus groups allowed for and encouraged interaction between participants. When nursing identities became a discussion point, for example, students were heard expanding, refining and modifying their understanding of this issue. As a consequence, richer more dynamic data was gained.
Ten focus groups, of between two and ten participants, were held on five different university campuses where nurse education was conducted. To ensure that student views are comprehensively surveyed it was intended to conduct interviews at six campuses as follows:
- One Sydney inner metropolitan campus
- One Sydney outer metropolitan campus
- One Melbourne metropolitan campus
- One Brisbane metropolitan campus
- Two regional NSW campuses
Two focus group sessions were held at each of the interview sites. The focus group participants comprised undergraduate students from all year levels. The interviews were conducted from mid August to late September 2001.
The campuses varied in their expectations and requirements of the research team. One university enthusiastically welcomed the research to be conducted on one of their campuses, organised interview facilities, invited students to participate and provided students with information about the project and the topics to be covered during the focus group. These focus groups operated very smoothly. In stark comparison, another university expressed great concern that students may be asked questions that would allow them to reflect poorly on the university. Once assurances were given that the aims of the project were to better understand the expectations and aspirations of nursing education students, permission was given to interview students at that university. However, the researchers were advised that university staff could provide no assistance in promoting the project to students and that students should be recruited via a mail out to randomly selected individuals. This could be organised, provided that 'stuffed envelopes' were supplied, by the Faculty manager for a fee of two dollars per envelope. Rooms could also be hired for the conducting of the focus groups. Only one campus acted in such a bureaucratic manner and while the research team complied with the University's stipulations, the procedure suggested by the Faculty yielded no focus group participants. Consequently, interviews were conducted on only five campuses.
The focus group sessions were recorded, in monaural mode, using 'conference' microphones and portable mini-disks recorders. This equipment was chosen because of its portability, ease of set up, unobtrusiveness in operation and the high quality of recordings possible to be gained. The recordings were transcribed and themes of discussions identified.
Some Universities were given an undertaking that the identity of the campus would not be revealed in any reports emanating from this research. Consequently, no universities or campuses are named. The students participating in the focus groups were advised that their comments would be treated anonymously and confidentially. Consistent with this undertaking, pseudonyms have been used in this report.
Outcomes and results of the study
The reasons students gave for choosing to study nursing; their career and lifestyle aspirations are summarised as follows, beginning with the most commonly given response.
Reasons for choosing to study nursing
- 31% had prior experience of working in a nursing capacity
- Family members had been nurses or had worked allied health or caring occupations
- Students had had the opportunity to observe nursing practice
- Nursing had been portrayed as a glamorous profession in popular culture
- Nursing was the best choice of the traditionally female occupations available
Presumed benefits of a career in nursing
- High prospect of on-going employment once training completed
- High job satisfaction provided by care giving
- Potential to work in a variety of different roles within nursing
- A range of lifestyle options available including working in different locations
- Nursing a foundation or stepping stone for other careers
- To remain in nursing and develop specialist nursing skills
- To move on to supervisory or managerial positions like Nursing Unit Manager or Director of Nursing
- To become a nurse educator or Advanced Nurse Practitioner
- To conduct research into nursing
- To work as a nurse and travel
- To combine working as a nurse with having a family
- To do aid or missionary work
Preferences of categories of student
- Young women noted that they could have children and return to work
- Married women could continue working if their husbands needed to be relocated
- Men sought job satisfaction and good job availability
- Recent school leavers generally aimed to nurse, specialise and advance in nursing. They also aspired to combine nursing with travel.
- Students with nursing and other employment experience had clear ambitions to pursue careers in nursing
- Students on rural and outer metropolitan campuses aimed to nurse within the area that they were studying
Any comments or queries should be sent to: highered@dest.gov.au
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last updated on Tuesday, 04 December 2001
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