i was wondering if anyone has heard of a clinical instructor failing a student when not receiving a failing grade?
one of the students in the last graduating class complained that the clinical instructor had failed her when she had received a "b" in clinical. she said the instructor told her she did not feel as if she was ready.
similarly, my friend in the nursing program with me is having the same problems. the instructor has told her that she feels as if she is not ready but she is receiving a "b". also, the instructor gave the student an incident report because she had a patient with low respirations and failed to have a watch (clearly there was a clock in the room) and felt the patients chest not abdomen. although, she clearly reported the situation of low resp. to the nurse and instructor, she still got reprimanded. do you think this is wrong? this is our last week of school and would hate to see anyone fail for this.
It is possible to have a cumulative grade of "B" based upon the first weeks of clinical, but not perform adequately or safely in the final weeks.
If this pertains to your grade, I would suggest meeting with your instructor to form an action plan of what you need to accomplish in the next few weeks.
If this pertains to someone else's grade, I respectfully suggest staying out of it.
No, it is not me and I was just curious if anyone has ever heard of this happening. This happened the last week of clinical. Which is very strange. You would think they would say something before the last week but her grade is a "B" currently and there are no more clinicals left. I just thought I would help her by getting some opinions.
I've found that steering people toward LPN school is sometimes a common second choice alternative that school administrators put out there. They are probably using this as a way to soften the blow rather than a genuine interest in increasing the ranks of LPNs. Personally, I find it unacceptable that they imply that one whose skills aren't good enough for RN can always become an LPN. LPNs need good skills also and to imply otherwise is not correct, or professional.
you are kinder than me, to me that is always meant as an insult....consiously or not....
you are kinder than me, to me that is always meant as an insult....consiously or not....
I originally was going to use the word "insult" but opted for political correctness, or kindness as you put it, instead. I knew a woman from work who was in an RN program, became pregnant, when she could no longer continue, she left being promised a seat when she was ready. When she went back, no seat in the RN program, but they "allowed" her to complete the LVN program. With a new baby to support (her husband left her), what choice did she have? She was not failing, unless you call pregnancy a failure.
We do not have letter grades in clinicals. It is pass/fail. There are a list of criteria we have to pass. Some of it is skill related. Do not get signed off within a certain period of time you are out. The rest is more subjective such as professional demeanor and clinical judgement. I do not know how many fails you can have before you are held back. I have always gotten all passes.
As far as the LPN thing. In my area the vocational school does the LPN program. The hours are longer (7-3:30 M-F) and the program is focused more on skill training. In the RN program you are demonstrated the skill once, may be have one chance to practice in front of the instructor, and then have check off the next week. Of course the lab and supplies are available. In the LPN program, they spend hours practicing the skills in the skills lab. In fact most of the program in taught in the lab.
"are some arbitrary? yes, we are human beings, with all the variety of shortcomings and strengths you'll find in every other population.
you will also not be told all the details that go into a ci's decision, that is between the student, the ci and the program director. students do not always share the whole truth of what they were told in their conferences, go figure. it is an extremely difficult decision to make, there is no joy in failing a student. it is rare to fail a student based on just one incident; there is likely far more to the story. if there is a subtle pattern of poor or just not quite adequate performance, the "one incident" may just be the culmination of observations, the straw that "broke the camel's back" as it were."
yeah, this makes sense. i doubt that she took pleasure in failing the student... i am just saying from a student's point of view how devastating that would be. i know also how one's performance can be affected by nervousness from an instructor standing over your shoulder knowing they are watching meticulously for any flaw in your technique. this girl, that i was talking of earlier, had gotten back into nursing 3 after a couple of semesters off, and her clinical skills were rusty. the "straw that broke the camel's back" here was it took her more than 20 minutes to take a manual blood pressure....
How can an LPN have weak clinical skills when that's what LPN's do?
Geezeum.
Hey, I'm not picking on LPN's.... I promise I meant no harm. I am just saying what the instructor said. She failed the girl from a 2 year RN program, and just told her that she needed to just find an LPN program, that it would better suit her.... I have heard that LPN school is no walk in the park either. It may be that because LPN is an 18 month program, and since she already has nursing 1 & 2, it would count towards that, and they could just finish up as an LPN in a few months. I've heard of students failing from our program and getting that, then going back to LPN to RN bridge program. Maybe that's what she was talking about... Just glad it wasn't me. I really was just restating, and meant no insult towards LPNs. I personally have learned more from the LPN's on our clinical floor this semester than some of the snotty RNs who will not give a student the time of day... Even though one of those snotty RN's was in MY MICRO class!!! Go figure.
How can an LPN have weak clinical skills when that's what LPN's do?
Geezeum.
That's what happens to people who fail out of our RN program. The DON and the instructors tell them to join the LPN program in the next rotation. I have never understood it, but I see almost every one of them in the LPN program.
In our school, you could be passing with a 100% on all your exams and still not pass if you get a unsatisfactory in clinical. We have three key skills that we have to pass in addition to papers that we need to hand in and other safety issues. But we would be well aware that we were having trouble way before the last week and it wouldn't come as a surprise.
In your friend's case, I could see her legimately getting a "B" and still fail if she failed a key skill or the instructor felt she was unsafe. But I am surprised this was not mentioned before? It could be also that your friend is trying to save face by not mentioning everything that had gone on in the past. And it is possible that the instructor is wrong. It just is hard to judge not knowing the instructor or the student.
In our school, you could be passing with a 100% on all your exams and still not pass if you get a unsatisfactory in clinical. We have three key skills that we have to pass in addition to papers that we need to hand in and other safety issues. But we would be well aware that we were having trouble way before the last week and it wouldn't come as a surprise.
In your friend's case, I could see her legimately getting a "B" and still fail if she failed a key skill or the instructor felt she was unsafe. But I am surprised this was not mentioned before? It could be also that your friend is trying to save face by not mentioning everything that had gone on in the past. And it is possible that the instructor is wrong. It just is hard to judge not knowing the instructor or the student.
it was stated in the OP that the student was maintaining a "B" in clinical....
it was stated in the OP that the student was maintaining a "B" in clinical....
Yeah, I got that part, which was what I was trying to say in paragraph 2 .
Let me try this again after sleep. A b grade in clinical probably is due to papers that have to be written such as care plans and observations, dosage calculations, etc. Perhaps some school is different, but skills usually are a pass/no pass or satisfactory/unsatisfactory type deal. Safety has no grade letter, you either are or you aren't. So you could have a b and still fail clinical if even one skill isn't passed or you are deemed unsafe. We really don't know the whole story here, but like I said, I find it hard to believe comments weren't made before, even if they weren't "formal". Although it is possible that the instructor wasn't fair, and I have seen that happen. I think it is just hard to judge given the limited info here, but wanted to give the op some ideas.
To the op, the only help I can give is to have her check out the grading/passing policy and see if there is anything there that can help. My assumption is that she will have to have something written up on her that explains the reason for failing. Have her ask for that. Because even if it is legit, she will need to know what she can improve on next time. I wish I had more, but experience on this site and being in clinicals thru LPN and 2nd semester RN school has shown me that fighting probably won't help.
Our program is based on points but an instructor can fail you for putting a pt. in physical jeopardy. This of course would be the instructors definition of "physical jeopardy". IMO this clause can be used for good reason or abused as an excuse to fail someone.
Yeah, I got that part, which was what I was trying to say in paragraph 2 .
Let me try this again after sleep. A b grade in clinical probably is due to papers that have to be written such as care plans and observations, dosage calculations, etc. Perhaps some school is different, but skills usually are a pass/no pass or satisfactory/unsatisfactory type deal. Safety has no grade letter, you either are or you aren't. So you could have a b and still fail clinical if even one skill isn't passed or you are deemed unsafe. We really don't know the whole story here, but like I said, I find it hard to believe comments weren't made before, even if they weren't "formal". Although it is possible that the instructor wasn't fair, and I have seen that happen. I think it is just hard to judge given the limited info here, but wanted to give the op some ideas.
To the op, the only help I can give is to have her check out the grading/passing policy and see if there is anything there that can help. My assumption is that she will have to have something written up on her that explains the reason for failing. Have her ask for that. Because even if it is legit, she will need to know what she can improve on next time. I wish I had more, but experience on this site and being in clinicals thru LPN and 2nd semester RN school has shown me that fighting probably won't help.
The grades in our program are based on points. she had to have a reasonsable amount of points to obtain a "B". For example, it states performs safe medication administration that is 10points so if you make a mistake etc. you will not get the 10points that is just one area. The clinical instructor does write below the areas of improvement. Unfortunately in this case the student performs well and knows what she is doing but she is non-aggressive and I think for that matter she held it against her. I know that being aggressive can be very important in certain situations but i feel as long as the person is performing well and noticing a problem and fixing the problem there is no reason to try and fail the student. She was to go to the ER a week ago and the instructor told her no because the staff in the ER would probably just throw her in a corner, meaning she is not aggressive. I understand this as I am aggressive and try to push my way into things to hone my skills and I have spoken with this student about it and told her if thats what she wants you need to walk up to her and say today if there are any skills like IV starts, NG insertion I want to know so I can do them. I just still don't see how you could fail someone who is passing. Considering we have a evaluation with points , if the instructor did not like the way she performed then she should alter the points to reflect that.
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Nurse 2009
38 Posts
No, it is not me and I was just curious if anyone has ever heard of this happening. This happened the last week of clinical. Which is very strange. You would think they would say something before the last week but her grade is a "B" currently and there are no more clinicals left. I just thought I would help her by getting some opinions.