Table 2 Matrix 2: mutual expectations to ensure teaching and learning quality and employability, graduates in postgraduate nursing coursework
Guiding principles | Curricula are underpinned by: • Mutual understanding of the goal postgraduate attributes. The key question should always be: “What sort of postgraduate do we want to produce?” • Clear articulation of mutual curriculum values via a conceptual model of nursing practice, such as the Strong Model • Equal industry and academic referencing • Respectful relationships between industry and academe, which has mutual mentoring and capacity building processes embedded to establish a sustainable teaching and learning community of practice • Distributed leadership with mutually-determined, well-articulated, fit-for-purpose roles for each person. A ‘consortium’ approach is ideal. • Industry engagement in academic activity that is adequately resourced in human and material terms to ensure robust curriculum development and delivery • Mutual articulation and understanding of student, organisational and professional needs | • Mutual understanding of entry and exit requirements • Robust evidence • Explicit relationships between, and integration of, all course content and strategies • Viable inter-institutional methods of assuring learning and teaching standards • Evaluation underpinned by mutually-relevant metrics • Curricula that are jointly developed and delivered by health services and universities are informed by a viable, mutually-acceptable business model • Accountability for implementing agreed actions is built in • Articulation process between health service and university courses should be flexible and seamless for students, with clearly articulated processes. | |||||
Course development | • Agreed terms of industry-academic engagement established; e.g.: ◦ Who will be involved in the clinical learning agenda (students, industry representatives, academics, consumers), and how will this be determined ◦ Extent and mode of their involvement ◦ Methods to identify and resolve clinical, academic and regulatory issues determined ◦ Articulation and actioning of enablers to engagement ◦ Articulation of and solution to barriers to engagement ◦ Timing and format of joint communications ◦ How distributed leadership will be enacted | • Forward mapping: Developmental learning outcomes that take student from the known to the unknown (i.e. equivalent to knowledge→skills→application; or competence→capability) are scaffolded throughout the course, units and assessments • Back mapping: The ideal course graduate is the starting point. Backward design begins with the objectives of the course—what students are expected to learn and be able to do on graduation; it then proceeds “backward” to create learning experiences and strategies to achieve those goals • Openness to a ‘pick and mix’ or ‘shopping cart’ approach; that is, modular approach where all modules are focused on learning outcomes, but the mix of modules is adaptable to student needs | |||||
Course delivery | Course outcomes | Content | Contexts of learning | Teaching approaches | Learning approaches | Assessment principles | Assessment types |
Target postgraduate capabilities as per Strong Model are articulated and woven through all aspects of course | Specialty college or association-specified content that is competency-driven (AQF Level 8) Driven by discrete context of practice and explicitly underpinned by theory as well as competency (AQF Level 9) Build on resources health services and universities have already developed; e.g. advanced life support in university course assumes achievement of basic life support competency in hospital | Acute settings Community settings Policy settings Simulation lab Face-to-face (lectures, tutorials) Online (synchronous and asynchronous) | Scaffolded from information transmission, to concept acquisition (knowledge), to concept development (skills), to concept change (application) All teaching strategies and assessment processes scaffold developmental learning outcomes Interdisciplinary teaching Cross-specialisation teaching (e.g. emergency nurses teach physical assessment) | Industry case study Clinical simulation Industry mentoring Industry placement Rotational placements Developing patient plans Self-directed learning Group learning Individual learning Remote simulation | Clinical competency assessments and processes are consistent with the NMBA position statement on assessing standards for registered nursing practice (2015); e.g., clinical competency assessments are performance-based and undertaken in the practice context by assessors who are appropriately clinically and academically prepared. Clinical competencies should be assessed by clinicians, theoretical assessments by academics but all jointly decided on, depending on context. Flexibility in clinical competency assessment fundamental; e.g. viva, observation, simulation, performed via telehealth. Depends on what is available in context Academic assessments and processes are congruent with Australian Tertiary Education Quality Standards Agency (TEQSA) imperatives Professional curriculum development and delivery opportunities enabled for teachers, especially industry-based teachers Standard processes implemented to ensure a) accurate calibration of markers and b) robust and transparent moderation processes across academic and industry contexts Mutual agreement on performance expectations e.g. what is a pass? Dilemma-based (i.e. problem-based) learning grounded in real practice problems heighten engagement and reduce incidence of plagiarism | Competency assessment Practice audit Create policy and practice guideline Present in-service Classical essay Classical multichoice and short answer exams Portfolios of key competencies and capabilities Small or large thesis or project | |
Course evaluation | Processes established for: • Objective student evaluation • Regular and systematic inter-institutional quality assurance (benchmarking), review and moderation of curricula | ||||||