Nursing Education & Research

Biography

She is currently an Assistant Professor and Faculty Lead for the BScN Accelerated Stream at McMaster University, Canada. Dr. Pratt’s doctoral research focused on the evaluation of unsatisfactory student performance in professional nursing practice courses from the clinical faculty perspective. One of her research recommendations was to develop a multimodal orientation program for novice clinical faculty. She recently completed the Priority Area in Learning and Teaching (PALAT) grant from MacPherson Institute for Leadership, Innovation and Excellence in Teaching based on this research recommendation. Her other research interests include Scholarship of Teaching and Learning in Higher Education, Student Engagement in Large Group PBL and Clinical Lab, and Interprofessional Simulation Learning. Her primary teaching responsibilities are with the undergraduate program. She teaches PBL courses and supervises professional practice students in adult medical-surgical, oncology, and maternal-child practicum settings.

 

Abstract

There is a growing body of literature on the ‘failure to fail’ unsatisfactory students in nursing and other professional health disciplines. While passing underperforming students can pose serious consequences for patient safety, it can also negatively impact the credibility of educators, nursing institutions, and the nursing profession. Clinical instructors comprise a nursing faculty group that plays a fundamental role in evaluating the learning and development of students. A study at a collaborative undergraduate nursing program in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada revealed that novice and part-time (sessional) clinical instructors tended to pass students who did not achieve course requirements due to personal, professional, and organizational factors associated with failing struggling students. This study further revealed the clinical evaluation process to be emotionally draining for instructors who have failing students.

This current quality improvement project involving a multimodal orientation for novice and part-time clinical instructors was designed to address the clinical nursing faculty concerns that emerged following the study described above.

The multimodal orientation consisted of didactic, interactive, and mentorship experiences to develop faculty members’ skill with assessment and evaluation of unsatisfactory students in clinical practice. Ten novice participants with three or fewer years of clinical teaching experience participated in an initial workshop on the ‘failure to fail’ phenomenon and learned how to support struggling students in clinical practice. Then, over two semesters from September 2017 to April 2018, participants were paired with experienced clinical instructors for mentorship. Participants were interviewed at the end of the academic year about the usefulness of the multimodal orientation. Most participants’ accounts revealed that the workshop helped increase their understanding about managing unsatisfactory students in clinical practice. The importance of assigned mentors in assisting novice instructors to navigate clinical teaching and evaluation of unsatisfactory students cannot be understated. This quality improvement project highlights that providing instructors with knowledge, skills, and mentorship during their early clinical teaching careers can develop their confidence in their evaluative clinical teaching roles.