As described in an earlier blog (What Is Excellence), clinicians such as NPs and others are typically prepared at “entry level”. That’s just the way it is. Academic programs are standardized. Students entering the program are not standardized.
Some students have extensive clinical experience, others have little or none. Some students are enthusiastic learners who challenge themselves throughout the program, others strive to check required boxes and make it through. Since programs are created to meet generally broadly defined standard competencies, it is left to the program leadership and faculty to determine how, when, and to what degree the competencies are being met. This is nothing new.
What is new, is that academic programs in wide range of areas, including ours, are being pushed to do more and more--with more students, fewer faculty, fewer 1:1 interactions, fewer opportunities to interpret and elucidate competencies and fewer opportunities to inspire and transform students.
In your pursuit of excellence, I ask you to consider the pervasive educational environment and what you can do to enhance the development of future graduates—NPs or others. This is a responsibility we all bear, regardless of whether or not we are faculty members. Ours is a clinical discipline and our clinical experiences, or preceptorships, are a (maybe THE) critical component of our academic programs. Most NPs have an opportunity to make significant contribution through serving as a preceptor.
If you are a preceptor, think about how you can enhance the experience obtained. Recognize that you are a “clinical educator”, not simply someone letting a student document a given number of patient encounters and hours. Confront the limitations you recognize in academic programs, the clinical experience, and/or the student readiness and interest in getting the most out of each encounter. Really connect with the learner, observer, or wannabe clinician. In The Icarus Deception, Godin writes that “Everyone you interact with is changed forever. The only questions are: How will they be different? And How different will they be?” (p.69). Of course, he isn't talking about preceptorships or clinical practice. He's talking about leadership. And this same reminder is relevant to each encounter we have with each of our patients. But we are at a juncture where we must recognize and accept this responsibility in preparing the next generation of clinicians. How can we help them be different in knowledge and skills? And to what degree?