Discussion Board

Post-Think Tank Discussion.
September 21st.

Any thoughts you would like to share on the Think Tank? Please post them in our comments.

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Information from Today's Meeting.
Shannon Carter. September 16.

Trends Activity Picture (it may take a minute to download, it's large!)
Joyce DuBow's Presentation
Michelle Byrne's Presentation
Carol Clothier's Presentation
Virginia Chapter of the AARP
Nursing outlook article from QSEN
Good medical practices

Also, Alexia Green wanted to share this paper from last year's the Texas Consortium.

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Introduction.
Michelle Byrne. August 10.

As a CCI board member and Think Tank planner, I will take the first plunge into our community blog…. First a little about myself…. I have been a nurse for almost 30 years and went to University of Wisconsin-Madison for my BSN and MS… In my master’s my focus was nursing education and Nancy Diekelmann was my thesis chair and mentor. Upon moving to Georgia, I spent the decade of the 90’s working on my PhD, again focusing on nursing education. My clinical career was perioperative nursing and I loved intra-operative nursing. For the past five years, I had been teaching fundamentals of nursing, nutrition, and leadership at North Georgia College & State University. Last year, we just had our first graduate enrollees in a nursing education tract and now I solely teach exciting courses like theory, research, curriculum development and instructional design and methods. Almost 20 years ago, I taught at Alverno College in Milwaukee which is known for its Ability based curriculum with assessment woven throughout its teaching and evaluation practices. I think this background is important because one thing that Alverno College did well was weave self assessment into every competency based assessment.

Throughout my career, whether it be working with others in the clinical or academic arena, I’ve identified some persons with very little self awareness into their competence, or rather, incompetence. Often, we laugh when we are teaching a workshop or group of students as we say things like, “I know I am preaching to the choir”… because the folks who need the information are not there. So is self awareness a learned cultural value? Is self awareness foundational for continued competency? My mantra in my nursing education courses is A PERSON DOES NOT KNOW WHAT THEY DO NOT KNOW…

My mantra just reminded me of a poem I wrote entitled: From lay person to novice nurse: Professional Socialization in Nursing (Thank you Nancy Diekelmann!) It was based upon my interpretations of sophomore nursing student interviews in my master’s thesis:

I think that I know
Or do I know what I think?
How I wish that I knew what I know,
But I don’t….
So tell me that I know what I know
And then I’ll know, I think. Byrne, 1986

We encourage you to share your thoughts about yourself, your experience and your insights into the topic of continued competency.

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