Continuing education needs of community nurses, midwives and health visitors for supervising and assessing students.

The objective of this study was to ascertain the changing educational needs of community nurses, midwives and health visitors in relation to the teaching, supervising and assessing of pre- and post-registration students. A questionnaire was sent to all education institutions providing community nursing experience in England (Whittaker et al. 1997), which allowed identification of three centres for in-depth study. Questionnaires were sent to practitioners (community nurses and midwives, health visitors and school nurses), their managers, and teachers of community courses in the three centres: 314 were returned. Eight semi-structured interviews were undertaken with volunteers in each of the study centres (n = 24). Extensive demands are being made on community staff to provide learning experiences for students on a wide range of courses. Practitioners reported that in order to fulfil their teaching and assessing functions they needed continuing education in matters which would assist them to provide research-based practice and education, teaching and assessing in the community and personal skills, for example assertiveness and counselling. Less than a quarter of practitioners were undertaking continuing education courses. However, opportunities for further academic study varied enormously and most practitioners had to study in their own time at their own expense.