Learning Unit  4 – The Mentoring, Evaluation, and Tenure Process of Academic Nurse Educators

Successful transition to role as academic nurse educator includes understanding the issue, evaluation, tenure, and mentoring process.

Course Objectives addressed in this unit:

Differentiate effective behaviors for success as a member of the faculty within and between these three settings.

Describe the evaluation process of nurse educators.

Learning Unit Objectives:

By the end of the unit, the student will be able to:

1. Contrast methods utilized in the evaluation process of academic educators.
2. Discuss the role of mentoring for academic educators.
3. Compare the tenure process amongst institutions.
4. Oermann et al.– Chapter 1
5. Fritz article posted in the unit.
6. Martin & Douglas article posted in the unit
7. Hulton et al. article posted in the unit
8. O’Connor & Yanni article posted in the unit
9. Stamps et al. article posted in the unit
10. Penn et al. article posted in the unit
11. Honig et al. article posted in the unit
12. NLN Toolkit for faculty mentoring – https://www.nln.org/docs/default-source/default-document-library/nln-mentoring-toolkit-2022.pdf?sfvrsn=91c51d41_3
13. Documents (examples from a school of nursing):
    1. Faculty Position Description
    2. Faculty Prof Dev Guidelines
    3. Faculty Evaluation Procedures
14. Additional readings as needed to respond to the discussions.

*Journal articles must be published within the last 7 years from peer-reviewed journals.

Discussion Board:  Mentoring, Evaluation, and Tenure

Be sure to APA reference the required readings and article(s) in discussion board questions as applicable. 

1. Case Study:  Prof. Stellar is a new faculty member in a full-time, tenured track clinical faculty position. She has been a practicing RN for the past 10 years in pediatrics. Her highest degree achieved is an MSN in Nursing with an emphasis in nursing education and she continues to work PRN at the local children’s hospital in the pediatric ICU. Her contract states her job responsibilities include 70% Teaching, 30% Scholarship/Service. She has been assigned to teach the undergraduate pediatric clinical course in the spring semester and to help with the fundamentals skills lab in the fall semester. She has been assigned a mentor for the next year.
   1. Describe the expectations Prof. Stellar can have of the mentoring process and responsibilities of her and her mentor as related to current suggested practices. This discussion should be at least two robust paragraphs.
   2. Stellar is considering scholarship as related to her tenure track position. The administration has fully embraced Boyer’s expanded model of scholarship and is encouraging Prof. Stellar to consider scholarly activities she should plan to include in her first and five year goals to facilitate her success on tenure track. Create realistic goals that Prof. Stellar could accomplish in one year and five year increments related to the pillars of scholarship as described by Boyer.
2. There is much in the literature describing the potential difficult transition from clinical practice to role as academic nurse educator. Discuss the readings related to this transition and share your thoughts. What are the practical applications to consider? How can we better prepare nursing faculty? If you have personal experiences, feel free to share. This discussion should be at least two robust paragraphs.

Respond to two peers’ postings. Each response described below should be at least 1-2 robust paragraphs.

1. Compare and contrast your responses in the case study with your peers’ post.
2. Extend the dialog on how to better assist in the transition from practice to educator.

 

Describe the expectations Prof. Stellar can have of the mentoring process and responsibilities of her and her mentor as related to current suggested practices.