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Monday, 31 October 2011
Learning Objective 1: The learner will identify four mentoring needs communicated by junior nursing faculty teaching in undergraduate and graduate education.
Learning Objective 2: The learner will identify strategies associated with identified needs utilized by senior faculty members to assist in the mentoring and socialization of junior faculty.
Nursing Education is facing significant problems in recruiting and retaining qualified and educational prepared faculty. At the same time, Senior faculty is retiring at an increased rate. Once we recruit a faculty member it is imperative that they do not “burn out” and leave the profession. Concerns in assisting new graduates into their professional role are now shared by academics across the country. The challenges for junior faculty are to assume the educator role with all its responsibilities and be socialized into the larger academic environment. Junior faculty identified areas of stress and frustration which lead them to question their decision for seeking an academic position. There are few resources available to assist them in their transition into the educator role as their academic colleagues are stretched to the limit. To address this concern, junior faculty were approached to identify individual needs and create a plan to meet these needs. We know that mentoring new graduates into practice has been a valuable strategy in their retention rate. We now need to consider mentoring as a valuable strategies as a retention method for junior faculty. What better resource do we have then senior faculty who have lived experience as academics in a specific organizational structure. The process utilized for the identification of the needs and the strategies to meet these needs will be presented. Activities specific for Senior faculty serving as mentors will also be included. Situations involving teaching learning strategies, Negotiating, orientation, academic environment, and student advisement, managing problems, will be included. The evaluation of the strategies and mentoring plan will also be shared. We have innovative strategies to assist in teaching and this presentation will present innovative strategies to promote the professional development and retention of junior faculty will be demonstrated.