Thought I would throw a loose one into the fray.... I would love to be proven wrong on any count....
I honestly believe "enquiry based learning" (EBL) is a con. They basically say "go off and learn about X and present your findings to your group"... That takes a couple of hours of their time; but they bill the nhs for giving you FULL-time training, kerching! The part, however, that really worries me is the quality of the material that these future practitioners are learning and so going to base life or death decisions on in a very short time. The learning is un-checked as is the true competency of the student.
Overall, the students are being let down severly and their future patients are frankly in danger of recieving some very dodgy care based on unsupervised learning. Lives are at risk imho.
i think alot of the problem with students is the fact that alot of the mentors on the wards are bad quality and pass this on through their teaching, also the wards are very short staffed, its very difficult to spend time with a student if you are rushed off your feet because you are three staff down (which is often the case these days) only qualified myself two years ago and i can honestly say that nclex taught me more in six months than 3 years in uni did!
It was ever so that is why P2000 was introduced:rotfl:
I am now approaching the end of my second year and I honestly believe that of all that I have been taught in theory time; 85% has not be tested/vetted. There seems to be an "its on your honour system" at work and patients will die because of it imho. Human nature will always seek the quickest route to achieve a goal.
John
Hi, while'st EBL does seem like a bit of a con (in the sense that you teach yourself) I am suprised to hear a nursing student complain of a "Lack" of work !
I have yet to start, but I have several friends at various stages of their training at a variety of Universities and they tend to talk about the workload being rather heavy.
With regards to your above comment about 85 % of your theory not being tested ; well don't you get given assignments, essays, tests and exams ?
Aren't they marked, requiring a certain percentage pass level ?
I know that in the case of my student nurse friends, if you fail assignments or practical skills you will get thrown off the course !
Don't you go on practical placements where your knowledge and skills are continuously assessed ?
I'm just asking because it is the first time I have ever heard a student say that they do practically very little. Also the students I speak to, tell me they have to attend University 4-5 days per week whilst doing the theoretical learning and then have to attend practical placement 4-5 days per week.
You mention only having to attend 1.5 days a week !?
I was quite concerned about the possibility of the work being too much to cope with but now I know that there is the chance that I will only have to turn up one day a week and not have my work assessed, I feel much better.
I don't doubt that this is the case where you happen to be, but I doubt it is the situation of a 'typical' student nurse.
With regards to your above comment about 85 % of your theory not being tested ; well don't you get given assignments, essays, tests and exams ?
Aren't they marked, requiring a certain percentage pass level ?
I know that in the case of my student nurse friends, if you fail assignments or practical skills you will get thrown off the course !
Couldn't resist responding to this, hope you don't mind. I'm mentoring a student right now and she was just telling me she has an exam coming up in January on Epidemiology. I told her I had some articles which I could let her have to aid her study, and her response? - "Oh it doesn't matter, it's a 'seen' paper, so we know exactly what we are going to be asked".
I've also heard other students discussing amongst themselves how assignments are "borrowed" from each other! Just my opinion, but it seems to me there's a lot of plagiarism goes on these days, and as the title of this thread suggests : UK training = dangerous?
I've also heard other students discussing amongst themselves how assignments are "borrowed" from each other! Just my opinion, but it seems to me there's a lot of plagiarism goes on these days, and as the title of this thread suggests : UK training = dangerous?
I think that cheating and plagiarism can happen anywhere. It should be up to the tutors to detect this and fail the student.
I appreciate that people can manage to scrape through the course, putting in the minimum effort and study and I have heard horror studies myself but....
This thread seems to be putting across the message that most newly qualified UK trained nurses are unfit to practice and totally incompetent !
What happens when they are on clinical placement and have to demonstrate skills. Do the tutors pass them even though it is clear that they do not know what they are doing.
Although I imagine that some places of study can be lacking, it seems like a sweeping generalisation to say that UK nursing=dangerous.
I do know of many that are making huge sacrifices to do their training and spend almost every waking hour studying in order to remain on the course.
So all that seems to clash with the idea that you can just blag your way through training and no real effort is required...If this is the case, I really don't understand why so many nursing students are stressing about their studies
I think that cheating and plagiarism can happen anywhere. It should be up to the tutors to detect this and fail the student.
I agree wholeheartedly
What happens when they are on clinical placement and have to demonstrate skills. Do the tutors pass them even though it is clear that they do not know what they are doing.
This raises the issue of mentorship skills. When I trained (looooooong ago) we had to demonstrate safe clinical skills in a controlled situation. This took the form of a kind of "practical exam" where we were required to perform clinical tasks under the watchful eye of a Clinical Nurse Tutor, and if you failed these tasks, you were off the course, no matter how good an exam or assignment you could write. But now it's left to the Mentor to decide if you're clinically competent, and as has been said on other posts, some Mentors are either too busy or stretched with their own workload to bother or even care. Sad, but true, and it's not fair to the Student. Bring back Clinical Nurse Tutors is what I say, who have the time and resources to concentrate on teaching clinical skills without having a patient load to worry about.
I am due to start training next year and I hate the idea of spending 3 years receiving sub-standard education...
I mean if the standards are really crap, then that would make things easier as I would have a much better chance of passing but....
The thing is, I'm not just in it just to pass and gain a qualification....I want to learn and recieve the best training possible. I want to be able to do a good job at the end of it and be prepared.
I suppose if all this is true, then I will just have to try and complement what I am taught with a lot of independent study or something....
The University I am going to is supposed to be one of the best, so hopefully the teaching won't be as rubbish as was suggested in some of the earlier posts!
I am due to start training next year and I hate the idea of spending 3 years receiving sub-standard education...
I mean if the standards are really crap, then that would make things easier as I would have a much better chance of passing but....
The thing is, I'm not just in it just to pass and gain a qualification....I want to learn and recieve the best training possible. I want to be able to do a good job at the end of it and be prepared.
I suppose if all this is true, then I will just have to try and complement what I am taught with a lot of independent study or something....
The University I am going to is supposed to be one of the best, so hopefully the teaching won't be as rubbish as was suggested in some of the earlier posts!
Nicky, sounds like you have a great attitude so please don't be put off. The nursing profession needs people like you who want to be good nurses and not just scrape by. Good luck to you :)
People love to slag off the training but it's 50% in uni and 50% in practice so half the blame of an issue with the training goes back on to the practice areas moaning about it! The biggest danger to training is bored, disinterested mentors who don't know what they are talking about - and there's a fair few of them. Out of date knowledge, which is combatted by Evidence Based Learning is dangerous, no doubt, and it's what led to EBL being introudced because people where making stupid mistakes by not reading the available material to implement best practice.
Ine very nursing intake, under every system of training, there's been good and bad nurses - just the same as any course. :)
Nicky - the first 3 years just kit you out to start learning properly when you become a staff nurse, I learnt loooooooaaaaaadddds as a student, but nothing compared to what I learned in my first 6 months of being qualified :chuckle
What happens when they are on clinical placement and have to demonstrate skills. Do the tutors pass them even though it is clear that they do not know what they are doing.
This is an interesting topic and one which would be too complex to go into fully in a post - I done an essay on the topic and was astounded by what I found as part of my mentorship course. In 2004, K. Duffy was asked to research the failure to fail by mentors, her report is on the NMC website.
This may go a bit off topic now, but as part of my research, I found 9 reasons sited as to why nurses fail to fail:
1) Nurses do not feel it is their job to fail students, but the colleges.
2) Mentors find the assessment documentation confusing.
3) Students not having long enough on clinical placements.
4) Allocated mentors having insufficient time spent working with students.
5) Some mentors had previously failed students and regretted it.
6) Mentors worried about referred students being discontinued.
7) Failing a student may suggest they failed as a mentor.
8) Mentors expressing concerns to link lecturers, then passing student despite the concerns.
9) Mentors taking students 'personal problems' into account.
Personally, I work in the ED, therefore when I get a new student, I take into account that alot of them are clearly terrified of what they might see. I give them time under full supervision and ensure that they can justify why they might or might not report unusual observations. Find out what they've done before and what they might have as gaps in their learning. If they don't show a clear willingness to increase learning, I would refer them.
Failing students will always be a horrible, contentious thing to do, noone likes doing it! Hopefully by having nurses who assess students only having completed and passed the mentorship course, this will address the issue, afterall, if you pass a failing student who does not show competency in their tasks, they will be your collegue soon!
Within my department, and I give this only as an example of something which should have been discovered well before 3rd year, we had to fail a student who I believe was subsequently discontinued. The student was very keen, willing to learn and competent in what they done.... however, had a very clear tremor. Now this wasn't a problem during most clinical interventions, however, they were entirely unable to even give an IM injection, they just shook so much. We gave them a chance and discovered it was probably not nerves which were causing this, which made us all feel awful. The student was given an intermediate assessment which asked them to improve this skill, however they was unable to and therefore were referred. The student possibly had an underlying medical condition which cause this tremor, however, it was not picked up by anyone until they came to us, which clearly made it worse for everyone, especially the student involved!
madwife2002, BSN, RN
26 Articles; 4,777 Posts
It was ever so that is why P2000 was introduced:rotfl: