I've been scanning posts in the nursing student section for awhile to get a "pulse point" Check about what's on students' minds. I'm a longtime educator (11+) years at a major university and a longer time nurse (29 years). I'm also an acute care NP with a PhD. I understand that this site has forums for networking, venting, problem solving and support for students of various levels. I find it utterly fascinating and disturbing about how much of the frustration is displaced to instructors when students' achievements don't match their personal expectations.
Timefor a few realities about faculty:
1. It's hard to recruit and retain good clinicians to teach when the academic side pays much less than the corporate side.
2. We don't set out to trick or "weed" anyone out. We need to know that students have achieved a minimal mastery level of key concepts.
3. There is an expectation that students who want to be nurses will do the work in terms of preparation, reading, asking questions, and coming to class.
4. We expect you to be a thinker and apply the information to different contexts. It is not unreasonable to expect you to pull prior content from other courses through to the patient in front of you right now. Patients will die and/or have bad outcomes if you can't minimally apply key content to different situations and critically think.
i think I'm done lurking here. I wish all the students the best of luck going forward!
If you are going to quote me, be honest enough to quote the whole thing, more than a little disingenuous, on your part.
Disagreeing with someone is not the same thing as "attacking" them. There was no "attack" here, there was disagreement and the presentation of another (differing) opinion on the topic. I suppose, by your definition, YOU are attacking the next person because you disagree? Lots of punctuation marks doesn't make it more valid than someone else's. You hold one opinion, someone else holds another.
Really the only way to have a constructive debate, don't you think?
I am not saying that there are teachers out there who are still learning their roll, or are even made to be classroom teachers, maybe they need to stay in the clinical setting. Classroom is a far cry from bedside care and precepting. Clinical facilities are making it harder and harder to even get student nurses into the facilities to learn. (But that is another discussion) We as students in a a career that is life long learning must also take the responsibility of out own learning, and if your instructor is not giving you what you need you speak with them, if that does not work go to the Director, if that does not work go to the Dean of Instruction, and at the least to the President of the college. Use your Student activities council as well. Go to your student advisor/ student services/tutoring. There are many avenues available to you, these are the things you need to learn as a student, know how to find your resources and how to speak to them respectfully, providing them with facts and solutions to the problems. College is an opportunity to transition to adulthood and self responsibilities, and I think that if you look in the right place you will find the mentor and support you need.
If you are going to quote me, be honest enough to quote the whole thing, more than a little disingenuous, on your part.
Seriously, you read what I wrote and this is all you got out of it?
I did not quote the rest of what you said as I was not RESPONDING to the rest of what you said, I was responding only to the part I quoted, which is why I quoted ONLY the pertient part. It wasn't taken out of context, so it was perfectly appropriate to quote only what I did. Your other, second comment had no relevance whatsoever to my point.
Nothing disingenous, nothing dishonest.....but apparently you didn't understand the entire point I was making, which IS too bad. Oh well, I tried.
I do think that their are some nurses who don't like nursing, and are not good at it, but they've already invested so much in their nursing education that they become instructors instead of just getting out of the field.
I had an instructor that slapped a student across the face- the student didn't report it, unfortunately. The same instructor shook her fist in my face while she growled at me- all red-faced and through clenched teeth.
She did not allow us to take notes in class- she absolutely forbade it.
She told us we were not getting a pinning ceremony. So, we students got together and booked a hall at the college to have one on our own. This instructor called and said she was me, and cancelled our reservation.
She taught false information as fact- remember the McMartin preschool scandal? All allegations were shown to be false, but she presented the original allegations as fact.
There are Instructor's who do a great job presenting material to students and others who may need additional training on how to present material, I however appreciate everyone of them being there. When I encounter the instructor who I am just not getting their style of teaching I seek other resources i.e. faculty tutoring with the instructor or other instructor's, peer tutoring,school library, u-tube can be your best friend I have found several instructor's who have posted lectures using the same text book that we are using and they have helped tremendously. I always e-mail and thank these instructors for their efforts and time. Lastly I always fill out my course critiques and be sure to include positive comments as well as the area's I believe need improvement. I give examples, dates/times of events. It is not always the instructor's fault either there are times when students are lacking the base knowledge and need remedial training. Instructor's need to be able to restructure their material to fit the needs of the majority of the class and deal with the minority individually,.
I would say most instructors are inspirational hero's. I have heard the stories of they want to make your life miserable...remember one student was doing the last day of her last clinical...something along the line's the instructor told the nurse with the student their to set up this line and it will be okay if they do. However, student didn't speak up knowing this was out of scope could do in clinical. Instructions for left nurse watched after clinical the student was pulled aside told failed nursing program and is done. Student had to advocate to the college officials told her needed to retake the class, but would be given second chance. Have to come in with your armour at times.
I love my school and program, but pharm, which is not easy has been made more difficult by the instructor. She emphasizes knowing the class of drugs and how they work but her exams ALWAYS have the names of drugs which she insists we do not need to know unless specified. I am hanging on by my fingernails and I am only in the first semester. My med surg teacher goes over some of the powerpoints and will always throw in "I'm not going to go into that, you can do it on your own." I don't mind doing it on my own because her powerpoints is physiology, what we need is for her to related HOW this translates to test questions and how to think like a nurse. If ALL 4 answers are correct, how do we choose the more correct. I am just frustrated that I have a medical background and more work experience, but these kids are good at taking tests and have great memories, get some of them on the floor and they have no interest which is where nursing IS! I heard that one of the straight A students took off of a clinical because her patient had HIV.
I am more than willing to put in the work and have to work triply hard, but honestly the professors have one mode of teaching. Funny thing we took a test at the beginning of the term so they can know what kind of learners we were. It was not a surprise that most of us were AUDIO learners, but they don't allow you to record lectures.
I would like to teach one day and I promise to be an advocate for my students instead of an adversary.
I am more than willing to put in the work and have to work triply hard, but honestly the professors have one mode of teaching. Funny thing we took a test at the beginning of the term so they can know what kind of learners we were. It was not a surprise that most of us were AUDIO learners, but they don't allow you to record lectures.
I would like to teach one day and I promise to be an advocate for my students instead of an adversary.
ANA advocates for the class and lectures be taped then they can be posted on the LMS for students to review and use for remediation. Unfortunately we still have some old thinkers, and we need more change agents. Go forth and conquer we need more quality teachers. Nursing is hard enough, and the information continues to get piled on to an old style curriculum. Concept based curriculum will help this and will become more focused. You will run in to all kinds of teachers, nurses, patients, families and part of what you learn as a student is how to work effectively for all individuals. Keep plugging away. Passion and endurance will get you where you want to be.
I have noticed that many professors at my school are starting to offer audio presentations for those who are not visual learners. This is a positive step, in my opinion.
I love it when professors put lectures online. That way, if I don't understand something, I can review it ad lib.
...I find it utterly fascinating and disturbing about how much of the frustration is displaced to instructors when students' achievements don't match their personal expectations.
Is this NOT true of every profession?
I believe that: "When you point a finger to blame someone else, there are 3 fingers pointing back at you!"
Confession time - as much as I love my kids, there were times in school when I resented them. We only had one flipped classroom teacher and I realized I learned so much more from her lectures that I wished we'd done it that way all along. But.... When you have kids.... It simply isn't possible to juggle it all as thoroughly as you should consistently before every class. (Wish I could have studied abroad, too, but that's another topic.)
Not once would I think to blame the instructors for that, though. I set my sights on what balls I was willing to drop and when, and I accepted the consequences (lower grades from time to time). I think it's fair to expect the student to be responsible for their own learning. I also think it's fair to expect the instructor to add to it. Ultimately, however, it's the student who is earning the degree and therefore the student who the final responsibility is going to rest on.
Bravo! I too am sick of being blamed for poor grades by students who can't think (and don't see this as a problem they need to address), skip class, don't read, don't ask questions, don't come to office hours, are on FaceBook or text during class and more.
Those who project the reasons for their bad results onto others (the faculty are too tough) are less likely to make it, so stop blaming others, right now. Likewise, people who believe that we each only have a fixed amount of smarts, or math ability, or writing skills, or whatever are far less likely to succeed. If instead you look inside yourself and say "What could I have done better to master this?" Or, "I wonder what so and so does to get good grades." are able to figure out how to get better.
The next time you do badly in something, please look in the mirror.
morte, LPN, LVN
7,015 Posts
If you are going to quote me, be honest enough to quote the whole thing, more than a little disingenuous, on your part.