Question of the Month: Should All Adjunct Faculty Have a Masters Degree?

Published

  1. Should All Nursing Faculty (Even Adjuncts) Have a Masters Degree

    • 34
      Yes - This is necessary to ensure the highest caliber of instruction for our students.
    • 26
      No - This is unnecessary and unrealistic.
    • 19
      This really depends on the circumstances of the school and area.

79 members have participated

This is the subject of great controversy here in North Carolina. If this ever were to become the standard set by the BON, many nursing schools across the state would close due to the acute shortage of faculty. Many schools rely on part time adjuncts for clinicals. Finding adjuncts with a BSN is a challenge; finding adjuncts with a Masters is just about insurmountable.

I am interested in hearing your viewpoints about this subject.

GrannyNurse - I agree with you. I'm a case manager who recently went back to prn staff work (I just finished my MSN) and enjoy the patient contact.

One of the reasons I am return to a graduate program to obtain my MSN as a Family NP, is because I miss the patient contact. When I worked as a case manager, I had daily contact with my clients, their employers, their healthcare professionals, their families, their educators. Today, many of the things I did in the field are now done by telephone. Education, be it with a client or a nursing student, be it in the home or in a nursing program, requires a degree of knowledge, skill and education, as well as clinical practice. To lower the standards, to allow a nurse with only a BSN to be an adjunct faculty member is wrong. I am sorry but as a BSN graduate, one does not have the necessary education to share the knowledge and skills. At minimum, an MSN is necessary.

Grannynurse :balloons:

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in MS Home Health.

Good point on the salary. Stinks for the education leaders to make less than my friend who picks up garbage..........ah the value of nursing

renerain :rotfl:

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Nephrology, Cardiology, ER, ICU.

Yes, and the thing is, the nursing profession as a whole is the big loser.

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I have been working in OB for 25 years.

Nevada has the same problem.

I'm not exactly sure what you mean by adjuct. For faculty, clinical or otherwise our Board say MSN minimum. BUT they have allowed some hard pressed schools hire BSN faculty who are working on their masters.

I am from Florida and they are so desparate for Nursing Instructors that they have hired me to teach OB to LPN students. They did require that I currently enroll in a BSN program which I did. I don't think I would be cheating the students out of an outstanding experience, because OB is the love of my life.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
I have been working in OB for 25 years.

I am from Florida and they are so desparate for Nursing Instructors that they have hired me to teach OB to LPN students. They did require that I currently enroll in a BSN program which I did. I don't think I would be cheating the students out of an outstanding experience, because OB is the love of my life.

Being adjunct faculty for a PN program, in Florida, is quite different from being adjunct faculty for a professional program. The standards of practice and education are different. And I am not degrading PN programs but the standards are different and should be addressed differently.

Grannynurse :balloons:

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Being adjunct faculty for a PN program, in Florida, is quite different from being adjunct faculty for a professional program. The standards of practice and education are different. And I am not degrading PN programs but the standards are different and should be addressed differently.

Grannynurse :balloons:

Maybe the written standards of practice for the LPN program is different; however, I started out a CNA, then went back for my LPN. Five years later I went back for my RN and had the same instructors and felt as though I was receiving the same quality education on every level. :balloons:

Debbie

Up Vote Up Vote ×
as a new adjunct, and a professional student, i am on the fence on this topic. i am more than half way finished with my ms in nursing education, and i feel i have learned so much about education in general- teaching styles, learning styles and the way adults learn. now this is only because i am in the education track- many nurses who go to grad school take the ap role, where education is not emphasized. now on the flipside, just because i know all this (or will by the time i graduate) doesn't necessarily make me a good educator- or a good nurse for that matter. experience is soooo vital. real life experience. i've found, in the short time i spent teaching last semester, that the students have learned more from my antecdotes and 'real life tips' than anything else so far.

in a perfect world :chuckle , the msn should be required, but lets face it, we do not have enough ms prepared nurses to meet the demands of the schools right now. and honestly, what is the incentive? sure i like learning for learning's sake, but i'm not exactly looking forward to the paycut i'll be taking when i become a full time instructor (much less the $50k in loans i'll have to start paying off) :uhoh3: .

i agree with the fact that real life experience in a specific area is vital when teaching. that is what i'm hoping to do with my first experience as an instructor.

debbie :)

Up Vote Up Vote ×

I feel that Nurse Educators within the college/university settings do need to be paid better. I am a BSN nurse and currently working on a MSN degree as a Nurse Educator. I currently work within a healthcare facility and as an adjunct faculty member as a clinical instructor. I hear the senior faculty members saying that the salary they make is less than a staff nurse in the hospital and I feel this is uncalled for considering the educational background and importance of the position along with its requirements of knowledge and skill in nursing. Working hard to be both highly educated in nursing and highly skilled in the clinical arena should mean a higher salary than a staff nurse.

This is just one nurse's opinion.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Pediatrics.
I feel that Nurse Educators within the college/university settings do need to be paid better. I am a BSN nurse and currently working on a MSN degree as a Nurse Educator. I currently work within a healthcare facility and as an adjunct faculty member as a clinical instructor. I hear the senior faculty members saying that the salary they make is less than a staff nurse in the hospital and I feel this is uncalled for considering the educational background and importance of the position along with its requirements of knowledge and skill in nursing. Working hard to be both highly educated in nursing and highly skilled in the clinical arena should mean a higher salary than a staff nurse.

This is just one nurse's opinion.

:yeahthat:

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Gerontological, cardiac, med-surg, peds.
I feel that Nurse Educators within the college/university settings do need to be paid better. I am a BSN nurse and currently working on a MSN degree as a Nurse Educator. I currently work within a healthcare facility and as an adjunct faculty member as a clinical instructor. I hear the senior faculty members saying that the salary they make is less than a staff nurse in the hospital and I feel this is uncalled for considering the educational background and importance of the position along with its requirements of knowledge and skill in nursing. Working hard to be both highly educated in nursing and highly skilled in the clinical arena should mean a higher salary than a staff nurse.

This is just one nurse's opinion.

I couldn't agree with you more... :o

Up Vote Up Vote ×

This subject happens to be of particular interest and concern to me. I am currently teaching in a PN program. There are several main teachers. We all have at least a BS degree, except one teacher who has an ADN!!!! Not only am I appalled and shocked, I am angry that she was hired into that position. At the time of hire I presume things were desperate, but how desperate can we be when we are looking at ourselves as a profession? Our adjuncts who teach clinical are also not degreed. In some cases diploma school grads. However, they have been at our school a long time and do a fabulous job.

What do some of you think of this? As far as I know, this teacher makes just about the same salary as the rest of us teachers. It has created very hard feelings on my part, since I have the appropriate degrees. This just doesn't make sense to me in any way, shape, or form. Our state allows people to teach in vocational subjects that are their speciality and will certify them through certain courses, etc. That's fine for welding, but nursing???? Even vocational nursing? Your thoughts appreciated.

This is the subject of great controversy here in North Carolina. If this ever were to become the standard set by the BON, many nursing schools across the state would close due to the acute shortage of faculty. Many schools rely on part time adjuncts for clinicals. Finding adjuncts with a BSN is a challenge; finding adjuncts with a Masters is just about insurmountable.

I am interested in hearing your viewpoints about this subject.

Up Vote Up Vote ×
Specializes in Behavioral Health, Show Biz.

In order for Registered Nursing to be recognized as a profession and be on par with the other professions, I say, yes---Masters degrees are necessary for adjunct faculty members. In states, whereby advanced-degree nurses are practically inexistent, the state Boards of Nursing have their hands full. Do these schools of nursing close because of the lack of instructors?

There are some exceptional practitioners in nursing who are BSN trained and excellent teachers. These individuals make the best preceptors on the unit. To place under-credentialled RNs in faculty positions in our college programs for RNs, is unfair to professional nursing and to nurses.

If I had a crystal ball...

Up Vote Up Vote ×
+ Join the Discussion