Essential Tools for a Study Abroad Nursing Course

Reflective Journaling in Nursing Student Study Abroad Programs: Connecting Experience and Meaning

The purpose of this article is to describe the development and use of a framework of reflective journaling to help nursing and other health professions students understand their health-care experiences in study abroad courses. The framework provides specific, intentional, theory-based guidelines for connecting students' observations and experience with understanding of cultural differences that can lead to cultural humility (Foronda, Baptiste, Reinholdt, & Ousman, 2016).

A Teaching Strategy to Facilitate Nursing Students' Translation of Global Health Learning from Classroom to the Community

Integrating global health concepts in nursing curricula is important for a competent contemporary global nursing workforce. This article describes a teaching strategy that facilitates students' translation of global health content from classroom to the community. A community-academic partnership and a train-the-trainers' approach to support community capacity for working with refugees was implemented. The Community-As-A Partner model was used as the guiding framework. Additionally, the DEAL model was used to support students' reflections on their clinical experiences. A quiz, reflections, participant evaluations, and student peer evaluations were used to assess students' clinical learning experiences. Key lessons learned are also presented.

Establishment of a short-term global health nursing education experience: impact on students' ways of knowing

BACKGROUND

The Essentials of Baccalaureate Education for Professional Nursing recognizes that with the increased globalization of health care, professional nurses have to be prepared to practice in multicultural environments and must possess the skills needed to provide culturally competent care.

METHOD

Thirty-five baccalaureate nursing students participated in a short-term course abroad to Jamaica over a period of 3 years. The impact of such an experience on ways of knowing was assessed in 20 participants, using a visual analog scale.

RESULTS

Students believed that the short-term course abroad experience had a positive impact on their personal knowing and that they developed an understanding of a health care system different from their own, while reflecting on issues of social justice.

CONCLUSION

Results provide evidence of the positive impact on short-term course abroad trips on students' ways of knowing. Critical to establishment of these experiences is evaluation of their merit through documentation of student learning outcomes.

Challenges of implementating a doctoral program in an international exchange in Cuba through the lens of Kanter's empowerment theory

The literature in international education focuses primarily on the experiences of western students in developing countries, international students in western universities, the development of an educational program in a developing country, or internationalization of curricula in western universities. There is little in the literature that addresses the challenges students and participating faculty face when implementing a graduate program in a developing country. The purpose of this paper is to describe and analyze the challenges of implementing a doctoral program in an international exchange through the lens of Kanter's theory of empowerment. Recommendations to address these challenges will be made.

Views from the Global South: exploring how student volunteers from the Global North can achieve sustainable impact in global health

BACKGROUND

The body of research and practice regarding student volunteer abroad experiences largely focuses on ensuring the optimal learning experience for the student from the Global North, without equivalent attention to the benefits, if any, to the host institution in the Global South. In this debate article, we examine an often overlooked component of global student volunteer programs: the views of the local partner on what makes for a mutually beneficial partnership between volunteers from the Global North and institutions in the Global South.

DISCUSSION

To guide our discussion, we drew upon the experiences of a Kenyan NGO with a Canadian student volunteer in the summer of 2012, organized via a formalized partnership with a Canadian university. We found that the approach of the NGO to hosting the student mirrored the organizational behaviour theories of Margaret J. Wheatley, who emphasized a disorderly or 'chaotic' approach to acquiring impactful change, coupled with a focus on building solid human relationships. Rather than following a set of rigid goals or tasks, the student was encouraged to critically engage and participate in all aspects of the culture of the organization and country, to naturally discover an area where his priorities aligned with the needs of the NGO. Solid networks and interpersonal connections resulted in a process useful for the organization long after the student's short-term placement ended.

SUMMARY

Our discussion reveals key features of successful academic volunteer abroad placements: equal partnership in the design phase between organizations in the Global North and Global South; the absence of rigid structures or preplanned tasks during the student's placement; participatory observation and critical engagement of the student volunteer; and a willingness of the partners to measure impact by the resultant process instead of tangible outcomes.