Abstract: This report is an evaluation of the academic journey undertaken by a group of newly graduated nurses who were sponsored by a New Zealand district health board to work in a variety of primary health care nursing settings. The impetus for this pilot employment option was the Ministry of Health's focus on primary health care nursing and workforce development for this sector and the Expert Advisory Committee for primary health care nursing's recommendations to district health boards regarding employment of graduate nurses and support for them to engage in post graduate study. Evaluation participants were primarily the graduate nurses who were interviewed at the end of their first year of practice which was following programme completion then again nine to ten months later. Findings include the nurses reflections on what supported them and what acted to impede as barriers to their learning success and practice development. The report concludes with five recommendations that can be used to ensure that the travels of future newly graduated nurses taking this pathway are supported, safe and successful.

Abstract: This research is about preceptorship in nursing. There is considerable emphasis placed on health care organisations to support newly appointed graduate nurses, and preceptorship is a recommended model. Despite this emphasis, the author suggests that little is known about how preceptorship partnerships work in practice. The primary focus of this exploratory descriptive qualitative study was to explore the perspectives that preceptors and preceptees, who had worked in partnership, had about how they established and sustained their respective roles. Three sets of registered nurses who had recently completed a preceptorship experience were interviewed about their partnership. Content and thematic analysis of this descriptive data revealed four main themes. The preceptorship relationship grows out of respect for each another and develops as a result of honest and open communication. Preceptees who have an initial positive experience into their new work area settle quickly and efficiently into their new role. Preceptees appreciate preceptors who are welcoming, supportive and willing to undertake the role, while preceptors are happy to undertake the role if the graduate displays an interest in learning and are willing to be guided. The preceptee learns what it means to be a registered nurse in the particular working context, while the preceptor learns how to support learning processes and evidence-based practices. The author goes on to say that further exploration and investigation of these themes and of the relationships that evolve during preceptorship partnerships is needed. By understanding these findings, organisations can prepare both the preceptor and preceptee as they begin to undertake their role to ensure future partnerships will be successful.

Abstract: This research seeks to determine an evidence basis for selecting content for the clinical skills curriculum in an undergraduate programme. Thirty-three senior nurse clinicians from medical-surgical areas in 2 large hospitals offering student placements were asked to rate the frequency of performance of 77 skills for the beginning registered nurse. Those skills frequently used and rated over 65% were considers for inclusion in the undergraduate programme. Clinicians were asked to list the 10 most important skills and related level of competence expected from the newly-registered nurse.

Abstract: This thesis examines Pacific women's experiences of becoming a nurse and their first year of practice post-registration, within the New Zealand context. The participants' stories of being students and beginning practitioners are inter-woven with the author's own reflections as a nurse and nurse educator who also claims a Pacific cultural heritage. To create the space in which the stories can be laid down, the thesis includes a description of the migration and settlement of Pacific peoples in Aotearoa/New Zealand. This description shows how Pacific people have been systematically stigmatised and locked into marginalised positions by mainstream dominant culture. The thesis deconstructs, what the author describes as, taken-for-granted and self perpetuating conceptualisations of marginality that currently underpin most theoretical explanations and proposes a reconstructed map of marginality. This deconstructed/reconstructed map of marginality is used as a template through which the experiences of the participants are filtered and interpreted. Radical Hermeneutics provides a philosophical underpinning for this project that has as one of its objectives the desire to resist reducing complexity to simplistic explanation and superficial solutions. The thesis challenges nursing to examine its role in reproducing the hegemonic power of dominant culture by applying unexamined cultural normative values that create binary boundaries between 'them' and 'us'. At the same time the thesis challenges Pacific people to move past hegemonically induced states of alienation and learn how to walk in multiple worlds with confidence and power.