Mature Nursing Students

Nursing E-Learning The role of education is changing everyday as new technology, models and methods are introduced on a daily basis. As these transformations occur it essential for those within the nursing education fields are aware of the possible implications of these changes.

Distance education, online learning and e-academics provide great advantages for individuals and organizations who can implement a program or model that is aligned with the overall organizational strategy that provides students and faculty alike with a learning environment that performs well and promotes the fundamental truths about that subject, area of emphasis or route of information. The purpose of this essay is to explore the role of distance education and how it can negatively impact students who are not prepared to take on the role of online education.

This essay will demonstrate that using this educational model requires a certain type of student that can excel in this type of environment. This essay will uncover and discuss mitigation techniques to help lessen the impact of this specific issue on nursing students and develop a course of action that meets the challenges of distance education by providing the means to simply and coherently address this issue.

Challenges In Student Appeal While the 21st century as seen a new generation of young people utilizing technology for all its worth, there are still many who are ignorant to its greatest capabilities. Unfortunately this problem compounds itself by having these very same students who are ignorant of distance education are possibly the ones who need the education the most in our society.

Any online nursing program must have students who are ready and prepared to adopt this new type of learning model and become a more independent learner not relying on others to guide every step of the way. Internet is ubiquitous mainly, however there are spots in this world where interconnectivity is not achieved so easily.

The problem of wrong-quality students who are seeking education are simply not aware that distance education can be a useful and practical means to break free from their ignorance and provide a new way of experimenting life through the role of nurse or medical professional. Kenny et al. (2011) suggested that age and experience of this new type of nursing student reflects certain qualities that may have not been necessary for students in more traditional or face-to-face educational programs.

They wrote "while attempting to provide flexibility for students, education providers in this study identified that students need face-to-face contact, particularly in the first year of study.

The value of having contact with fellow students and educators appears to be more highly valued than the autonomy that distance education models afford the student." Having discovered that older more mature people who are now entering the nursing force and are being mandated to use e-learning or distance education models are not fully prepared to meet these demands provides the necessary motivation to correct this problem and make the necessary adjustments so that non-traditional students are more comfortable in their e-learning environments.

Options And Strategies As the nursing landscape has been flooded with older, and more mature people who may be more restricted in their understanding of distance learning and technological applications of communication technologies, it is necessary to determine how to model this problem to develop a course of action that can be seen as contributing to the problem and not simply adding more confusion to a complex situation and making it worse. Button et al. (2014) revealed important information about this topic in their review of literature pertaining to the topic.

The research concluded that "The rapid advances in computer information technology have important implications for both nursing students and educators worldwide. These implications include but are not only limited to the teaching and learning technology but also must include the technology that nursing graduates will be expected to work on a daily basis.

The review also confirmed that there is an urgent need to develop robust quantitative instruments to measure the impact, effectiveness and perceptions of students and educators who are using E-learning and the associated information communication technology." Meeting Challenges with Digital Information The main issue with mature nursing students' inability to master new technology within e-learning programs and distance education programs is detrimental to the quality of education that is being presented.

As in more traditional face-to-face programs, where more than likely that mature nursing student received their primary and/or secondary education, students could rely on the instructor more for their problems and ability to provide solutions.

The digital information landscape of today's world presents a need to transcend this old way of performing and becoming more aligned with the new models of performance that are being adopted and practiced in ever increasing numbers and provide the necessary data to suggests that nursing education in the future will predominately distance-based or digitally enhanced to include the necessary components of the medical world that will also use these very same technologies and approaches.

The education system will simply align with the profession itself and mature nursing students must be prepared to overcome these challenges. Leaders can use this approach to their benefit however if they are prepared to alter the normal course of action. This change in itself is the biggest challenge to incorporating this new technologically based approach to mainstream education. Leaders need to ensure that the quality of the education remains intact, as the main problem of keeping professional standards is when the loss of the overall mission or goal occurs.

As long as leaders are focused on teaching what the main core issues, it does not matter if the knowledge is digital or face-to-face. Recommendations The great demand for nursing students has caused the collective to recruit more from the mature base of people who can handle the job and are willing to change careers. To address the technology issues that accompany this problems requires the individual programs to provide sufficient help to those with technological ignorance and provide a model of learning that can help with this transition.

When this balance is achieved then the system itself can.