University lecturers need to help their students to develop ways of being that will allow them to flourish amidst uncertainty. Professional development workshops involving artwork and reflection provide a space where lecturers themselves can hold, examine and develop tolerance for uncertainty. Artwork and exploration of metaphors enable them to…

Older adults have always been important parts of children's lives, playing a variety of roles including grandparent, caregiver, friend, and neighbour. Grandparents also play a variety of roles in families. Often a child's first encounter with serious illness or death involves a grandparent or other older adult. Grandparents are also increasingly…

The Australian Disability Discrimination Act (1992) has challenged higher education to meet the increasing needs of students with different abilities. This may be more so in programmes that have practice components where students must demonstrate competency, regardless of their situation. This qualitative exploratory study undertaken at the…

The field of marriage and family therapy (MFT) has recently engaged in the process of defining core competencies for the profession. Many MFT training programs are adapting their curriculum to develop more competency-based training strategies. The Objective Structured Clinical "Examination" (OSCE) is widely used in the medical profession to assess…

The purpose of this qualitative study was to better understand the transfer of learning by uncovering how various factors supported the integration of knowledge and skills gleaned from the Faculty Development: Integrated Technology into Nursing Education and Practice Initiative (ITNEP) programs into nursing education curricula. Through interviews…

This article presents abstracts from the 2011 AMERSA National Meeting. It includes 2011 best abstracts on research, programmatic, and curricular presentations.

Background: Reflective practice is reported to enhance clinical reasoning and therefore to maximize client outcomes. The inclusion of targeted reflective practice in academic programmes in speech-language therapy has not been consistent, although providing opportunities for speech-language therapy students to reflect during their clinical practice…

This study explored the health care service needs and the major correlates of quality of life among 127 community-dwelling elderly Chinese immigrants in a western Canadian city. Participants were interviewed in their homes by trained, bilingual interviewers employing a structured questionnaire that covered a wide range of topics including health…

The purpose of this exploratory investigation was to share the strengths, challenges, and tensions of using Facebook in an undergraduate nursing program. The observations presented have emerged from information shared by study participants and the professional insights of the three researcher-authors who represent perspectives from nursing,…

The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between personality type and preference for instructional methodologies (lecture, online and simulation). The sample consisted of 94 practicing gerontology nurses (RNs and LPNs) who attended a continuing education workshop on the care of the acutely ill elder at a public university in the…

Providing experiences for international travel is an important aspect of higher education, and creating high-quality international exchanges can be a challenge. Developing appropriate experiences for nursing students may be especially difficult due to the complexity of regulatory and accreditation requirements. However, it is possible to find…

The purpose of this descriptive study was to examine the use of simulation technology within nursing programs leading to licensure as registered nurses. In preparation for this study the Use of Simulation Technology Inventory (USTI) was developed and based in the structure, processes, outcomes model and the current literature on simulation. The…

This paper examines and compares learning narratives associated with older men's participation in three community organisations in an Australian rural setting: an adult and community education provider, an emergency service organization and an aged care facility. The interview data are from a larger Australian study of learning in community…

The purpose of this comparative review was to examine the legislative evolution of school guidance and school nursing over the past century, in hopes of identifying reasons why guidance counselors have been more successful in compliance to recommended ratios than school nurses. A literature review was conducted including CINAHL, MEDLINE, ERIC and…

Education influences individual health and social care professionals and the systems in which they work. We describe a postgraduate educational program that did this through involving service users and carers in designing and facilitating teaching programs. A module of teaching was designed and delivered in partnership with users and carers from…