Karen Tarnow

Blended roles: preparing the advanced practice nurse educator/clinician with a web-based nurse educator certificate program

Changing demographics, a nursing shortage, and various societal changes underscore the need for nurse educators and new nurse educator programs. This article describes a Web-based nurse educator program designed to prepare advanced practice nurses for faculty roles while simultaneously preparing them as clinicians. Guided by adult education theory and self-directed learning theory, the Web-based Nurse Educator Certificate (four Web-based nurse educator courses including a teaching practicum) has been developed and offered to clinical masters and postmasters students. This article also describes student work with mentors, interactive Web-based teaching strategies, portfolios, graduate competencies, and initial evaluative data. In the first two years of the program, 48 students have taken at least one course in the Nurse Educator Certificate program and eight students have completed it. A Web-based nurse educator certificate program, as part of a clinical masters or postmasters program, has the potential to help meet the faculty shortage.

Preparing health professions' educators via online certificate program: structure and strategies for quality.

Educating the faculty of today and tomorrow presents challenges in the health professions. In rapidly changing clinical and educational settings, faculty need to be prepared to maintain course quality and promote student learning outcomes. This article provides reflective analysis of an established online Health Professions Educator Certificate Program and shares quality teaching/learning structures and strategies that provide flexibility for diverse interprofessional learners. A systems model of structure, process, and outcomes organizes the analysis.