This national conference held every two years and sponsored by the National League for Nursing promotes the advancement of nursing education science through research presentations, posters, and internationally renowned expert speakers in nursing education.

Morris presented an interdisciplinary collaborative project co-authored with Kim Stokes, chair and program director of the Physician Assistant Program. Their work was titled, “Uncovered: A Co-curricular Strategy Establishing Foundational Values for Interprofessional Education.” This Interprofessional Educational (IPE) experience brought together students in nursing, physical therapy and physician assistant programs to engage in mask-making as a creative method for professional identity formation and exploration.

Van Horn gave a podium and poster presentation from her work in collaboration with Lynne Lewallen at UNC-Greensboro on evaluation of competence in novice nurses. Their poster presentation was titled, “Bridging the Theory-Practice Gap: Employers’ Advice to Nursing Programs” and their podium presentation was titled, “An Exploration of Competence in the New Graduate Nurse.”

Their research lends important insight into employers’ expectations for new graduate nurses and can be used to help nursing education programs better prepare nursing students for entry into their professional nursing careers.

In this study, Van Horn and Lewallen administered an online survey to 68 hospital nurse educators in 12 states and conducted 30 qualitative interviews with hospital education directors and nurse preceptors. Key components of nursing competence were identified and methods to evaluate competence in novice nurses were discussed. Major themes important to nurse competence included basic nursing care, seeing the big picture, communication and personal characteristics.

The NLN Education Summit is a national nurse educators conference attended by over 1,200 participants from 650 nursing programs across the United States. The annual conference includes presentations by prominent leaders in nursing education who discuss innovations in curricula and their impact on safe nursing practice and health care. Research and educational podium and poster presentations address topics important for the advancement of nursing education. This year the conference was held from Sept. 28-30 at the Mirage Hotel and Conference Center in Las Vegas.