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Learning Objective 1: describe three ways a nursing student learns to differentiate important aspects of the patient situation through independent care of a patient.
Learning Objective 2: describe how the nursing student learns clinical agency and bedside ethics through the independent care of patients.
There has been little research on accelerated nursing programs and many schools have not tailored their curricula to meet the needs of this richly experienced group. The goal of this qualitative research study was to describe how students in an accelerated master’s entry program experientially take up the practice of nursing. A specific aim was: What formative experiences do students identify as helping them develop and differentiate their clinical practice?
Data from clinical observations and a combination of small group and individual interviews were collected over the first year of study for students (N=19) in an accelerated master’s entry into nursing program. Data were analyzed using interpretive phenomenological methods. Exemplars were used to articulate the formative skills learned through the independent care of a patient. These existential skills, or practical knowledge, included a developing sense of clinical responsibility, ethically driven by individual patients’ needs.
The results of this research contribute to nursing education by more clearly explicating the shared experience of students in accelerated programs during clinical learning, specifically describing particular situated learning experiences that helped students develop and differentiate their individual clinical experiences. Uncovering this taken for granted background gives new direction in theoretical and clinical nursing education, especially for accelerated and condensed programs, by articulating what it looks like to take on clinical responsibility from the inside of providing care.