Technology-Oriented Assessment of Professional Competencies in Nursing

Project description

Background

Vocational education and training is aimed at developing competencies for action that can be put to practical use on the labor market, but also reflected upon with regard to ethical standards and personal objectives. The assessment of competencies aims at achieving these goals by rendering productivity of educational pathways, the quality of individual educational institutions and individual learning success transparent and better accessible for targeted improvement measures.

The implementation of such assessments is particularly relevant regarding professions in the domain of nursing and caring. In this respect, profound changes are happening owing to demographic and social-political decisions. The lack of professional staff and hence a heterogeneous development of career pathways in the professions, imminent re-structuring of professions in nursing and caring and a lack of congruence regarding action-oriented training regulations and actual test procedures constitute some central elements of discussion on the topic. Accordingly, there is a strong interest in fundamental information for assessing and improving of vocational education and training in the domain of nursing and caring.

Besides high professional standards, the nursing and caring activities are more strongly characterised by additional factors than other professions, i.e. internal (emotional, self- reflecting, identity-related) and external frameworks of reference (pressure on time, institutional framework, conflicting situations, active development of relationships). These factors need to be considered when constructing competence models and test tasks for professional competencies of action.

Objectives

TEMA is a co-operative project that aims at the development and implementation of a computer-based test procedure for the assessment of competencies in nursing and caring. As a first pilot project for the cluster of “nursing and caring professions“, the co-operative project focuses on the exemplary field of nursing and caring for elderly people. Such a specific focus is necessitated by the research process. Presently, the development of professional competence models has only just begun for the domain of nursing and caring. So far, no elaborate work has been conducted regarding test procedures. Selection of competencies that are assessed will, however, principally allow for an adaptation to other professions in the field, such as nursing the sick, so that the respective competencies are regarded as typical and the test situations can principally be transferred to other professions in the domain.

Realisation

The research project is divided into four phases:

• Initially, the first project phase will be dedicated to identifying central demands on competencies. Furthermore, a competence structure model for assessing  competencies in the exemplary domain of nursing and caring for elderly people will be developed.
• In the second project phase, domain-specific test procedures will be developed and prepared for selected areas of competencies in order to obtain a prototype of test sequences for a computer-based simulation of action situations that are typical for the profession. This prototype will be subjected to a field test and further developed accordingly.
• A pilot study will be carried out in the third project phase in colleges that train nursing professionals specialising  in caring for the elderly, in the federal states of Bavaria and North-Rhine Westphalia. Testing will be conducted within the framework of final exams, with at least 400 students completing their training courses.
• In the fourth and final project phase, transferability of the assessment model that was originally developed for caring for the elderly will be tested regarding other nursing professions. A transfer concept will be developed and recommendations will be formulated for adapting the concept. Central scientific findings from the empirical test procedure and its transferability will be summarised in a final report.

Funding

The co-operative project TEMA is an integral part of the research initiative Ascot (Technology-based Assessment of Skills and Competencies in VET) of the  Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF). 

Co-operations

Research Institute for Vocational Education and Training (f-bb; co-ordination) Obere Turnstraße 8
90429 Nürnberg
Dr. Ottmar Döring
Tel.: 0911- 27779 14
Mail: ZG9lcmluZy5vdHRtYXJAZi1iYi5kZQ==

Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg
Faculty for Social Science and Economics

Kärntenstr. 7
96052 Bamberg
Prof. Dr. Eveline Wittmann
Phone: +49 (0)951-863 2725
Mail: ZXZlbGluZS53aXR0bWFubkB1bmktYmFtYmVyZy5kZQ==

FH Bielefeld
University of applied sciences; Nursing, care and health studies

Am Stadtholz 24
33609 Bielefeld
Prof. Dr. Ulrike Weyland
Phone: +49 (0)521-106-7435
Mail: dWxyaWtlLndleWxhbmRAZmgtYmllbGVmZWxkLmRl

Project Management

Project Details