A General Program in Nursing for the Graduate Nurse

Abstract

RECOGNIZING its responsibility for developing effective programs for graduate nurses, the faculty of Frances Payne Bolton School of Nursing of Western Reserve University undertook a 3-year study of the curriculum it offered. At the beginning, we identified and explored certain major issues in nursing education. One of these issues was concerned with the differentiation between the baccalaureate and the master's degrees. In seeking answers to the basic question, What should the degree of bachelor of science in nursing stand for? we had to formulate a new philosophy of. education for graduate nurses out of which emerged the principles that were needed to formulate the objectives for an educational program. Graduate nurses vary greatly in their levels of competence as measured against modern concepts of professional nursing. The typical basic diploma program is built for students who are high school graduates. At this level the educational program is aimed primarily at helping students develop understandings, skills, and techniques that are essential for bedside nursing. Additional general education and greater maturity are necessary if the students are to develop an increased breadth of understanding and insight into nursing; wider use of basic concepts from the physical, biological, and social sciences; increased judgment, and greater competence in using the problem-solving approach in nursing situations. In other fields professional education is built generally upon a background of at least two years of study beyond high school. Also, the trend in other fields of professional education is to require the programs in areas of specialization to be built upon broad and sound basic professional education. Therefore, we felt that the baccalaureate degree in nursing should provide depth and breadth in general education as well as enrichment and expansion in basic nursing. In view of this, we thought that the baccalaureate degree program should provide opportunities for the graduate nurse to increase her ability to give direct nursing care of professional quality. The program should provide a broad educational background for the graduate nurse in order to prepare her for newer professional nursing responsibilities in hospitals and in public health nursing agencies, and should serve as a sound basis for advanced study in a specialized field of nursing. To plan for these broad aims, our general program in nursing for graduate nurses was constructed on the baccalaureate degree level. Its general structure was designed to provide for the development of the graduate nurse as a person, as a responsible citizen in