Anyone Teach Clinicals w/ < 3 years experience?***

britnicole · Apr 22, 2011

i do not teach but one of my clinical instructors had about 2 years of experience and i learned so much from her. i think if you have your basic skill down and the patience to teach you will do great.

SummerGarden, BSN, MSN, RN · Apr 22, 2011

i know you only see bsn, but i suggest contacting the school to be sure. most schools, even community colleges, want 2-3 years of clinical work experience. they also want nurses who actively have a job on a floor (ltc or acute care) so that he/she is able to gain access to the clinical environment like the staff nurses. however very experienced nurses working in management or as nurse educators have been known to work pt as clinical instructors for my former adn program.

Heidi the nurse, BSN, RN · Apr 22, 2011

What clinical are you thinking of teaching? I remember vividly one of my psych instructors telling us that his first job was at a psych hospital in San Fransisco and one of his patients had jumped off the Golden Gate bridge and lived. My sister (who doesn't teach) worked at the burn unit at our state's level one trauma center and also at their ED.

I know both my instructor and my sister learned more in the first 6 months of working at those facilities than I learned in several years working in the same field but at a "run of the mill" facility.

elkpark · Apr 23, 2011

Clinical sites are arranged/negotiated by the nursing school administration and the administration of the healthcare facilities. Clincial instructors are, in my experience, not directly involved in that process. However, clinical instructors might have a choice of which of the clinical facilities used by the school they feel most comfortable teaching in. In my teaching experience, I've never been offered any kind of choice of where I wanted to do clinical -- I was just assigned to teach where (and when) the school needed me to. There is so much demand and competition among nursing schools for clinical sites these days that schools pretty much have to take whatever locations and schedules that hospitals (and other clinical settings) are willing to offer them.

Most schools want nursing instructors to have significant clinical experience -- a requirement of at least 2-3 years experience is common. I would be suspicious of a school that would hire someone with less than that.

Fiona59 · Apr 23, 2011

The local nursing schools require a degree, three or more years on the floor and still currently employed (because it's only a part-time gig) and the proven ability to educate.

But hey, if you read the Phillipines forum on this site, over there it is common to hire new grads as instructors.

Ultimately, to apply is your decision and reflects your confidence level in your nursing and teaching skills.

muffins20 · Apr 23, 2011

My first thought was no due to lack of experience, but on second thought I really learned a lot from quite a few newer nurses at my old job (they weren't clinical instructors tho, just staff nurses). They really took the time to explain the diagnoses, treatments, procedures, charting, organization, and were very supportive. A few of them even had really strong leadership skills on top of the knowledge. Not too long ago they were new nurses themselves, and they could remember/teach what helped them learn the ropes.

So it is possible it can be done well.

LifelongDream · Apr 23, 2011

I graduated from a Second Degree BSN Program in the Summer of 2009. I began working for the same program in 2010 after working for 10 months as a nurse in Pediatrics. I was very fortunate during my clinical rotations to work with a Flex Nurse (AKA a Float Nurse). I was exposed to a wide variety of experiences that my classmates did not get to experience. For most programs, having one year of experience in a hospital is more than enough to ensure that you will have the minimum knowledge necessary to teach new nursing students. Good Luck to you! :yeah: