Available online 11 April 2024, 103971

Author links open overlay panel, , , , AbstractAim

This study aims to elicit graduate entry nursing students' views on factors that enable and constrain their learning engagement.

Background

Learning engagement has been associated with student retention/attrition and the achievement of learning confidence and success. While all students are subject to challenges that affect their learning engagement, those experienced by international students who are learning in a foreign and unfamiliar context are of particular concern to academics. An understanding of international graduate entry nursing students’ perspectives on factors that enable and constrain their engagement can inform development of learning and teaching strategies that are more responsive to the needs of this group of students and can support their learning achievement.

Design

A qualitative descriptive design conducted in one Australian multi campus university School of Nursing. Participants included first and second-year international students enrolled in a graduate entry Master of Nursing course.

Methods

Data, including demographic information, was collected via a theoretically informed online survey consisting of a Likert scale and open- ended questions. This study reports participant responses to open ended questions included in the survey. A thematic analysis was used to interpret findings.

Findings

Analysis identified participants’ perspectives on factors that influenced their learning engagement in four theme areas: 1) Availability of study support resources, 2) Opportunities for social interaction, 3) Opportunities to build a sense of belonging, and 4) Constraints on development of a sense of engagement. Opportunities for social engagement emerged as a dominant finding across all themes.

Conclusion

This research, which focused on international students’ perspectives on learning engagement, contributed to existing knowledge on student engagement in higher education graduate entry nursing courses. Opportunities for social interaction within and beyond formal course learning experiences were valued by students and identified as key to their learning engagement. These findings have implications for academics and student support services who together, can influence the context of students learning to better meet their engagement needs.

Section snippetsINTRODUCTION

Successful completion of an accredited university bachelor degree is foundational for nursing registration and entry into practice in Australia. Universities offering bachelor courses in nursing are bound by the regulatory framework for nursing education that is required by the accrediting body, the Australian Nursing and Midwifery Accreditation Council (ANMAC) (2022) and the university regulator, the Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA) (2021). However, student experience is

BACKGROUND

A review of existing literature that explored student engagement in higher education, in nursing and in graduate entry programs in nursing established a basis for this research.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

This study was underpinned by Pittaway’s (2012) student engagement framework which is comprised of five generic dimensions of engagement among adult students: Personal, Academic, Intellectual, Social, and Professional. Pittaway’s framework provides a comprehensive lens with which to understand adult learner engagement, and formed the basis of the survey that was developed to guide data collection in this research. The following briefly explains the five dimensions of Pittaway’s framework.

Study Aim

This study aimed to elicit graduate entry nursing students' personal views on factors that enable and constrain their learning engagement.

Research questions

The following research questions guided our enquiry:

What factors enable and constrain graduate entry master of nursing students’ learning engagement?

Study Design and setting

The researchers chose a qualitative descriptive design to frame the research. A qualitative design enables researchers to develop a description of the perspectives of a diverse range of individual participants

FINDINGS

Analysis identified four main themes including, 1) Availability of study support resources, 2) Opportunities for social interaction 3) Opportunities to build a sense of belonging and 4) Constraints on development of a sense of engagement. Participant quotations that support each theme are presented in Table 3: Extracts from participants’ response to open ended questions.

DISCUSSION

The aim of this research was to understand factors that enable and constrain learning engagement for international students enrolled in a graduate Master of Nursing course. Analysis of qualitative responses extracted from our survey data, informed by Pittaway’s (2012) engagement framework, identified four main themes that contribute to existing knowledge on student engagement and participants’ perspectives on how engagement can be developed. Our analysis found that opportunities for students to

LIMITATIONS

There were several limitations of this study. Firstly, the study was conducted in one setting, which might have limited the generalisability of the results. Secondly, participant responses were confined to the parameters set by the survey. A follow up interview would add depth to the data collected. Finally, this study was confined to the perspectives of nursing students and did not include teachers. Future research should be considered to include interview methods and to compare and contrast

CONCLUSION

This paper illuminates international graduate entry nursing students’ perspectives on factors that influence their learning engagement. Use of Pittaway’s (2012) engagement framework to guide our analysis, has enabled a structured approach to data collection and interpretation that is not reflected elsewhere in the nursing literature. International students’ perspectives on specific factors that shape their learning engagement include motivation to study nursing, availability of study support,

Funding sources

No external funding

Uncited references

(Australian Nursing and Midwifery Accreditation Council, 2022, McLaughlan, 2023, Merriam and Tisdell, 2016, Sun et al., 2020, Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency, 2021)

CRediT authorship contribution statement

Margaret Louise Yen: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Methodology, Supervision, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. Kabir Sattarshetty: Conceptualization, Investigation, Methodology, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. Tebbin (Fung) Koo: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Visualization, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. Ethar Alsharaydeh: Data curation, Methodology, Project administration,

Conflict of interest

None

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

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