How Prof. Smith's DNP Courses Infuse Personal Experience, Potato Heads, and AACN Essentials Mandates
It was a terrifying ordeal—precisely why professor Shelly Smith, associate dean for graduate programs and a professor, shares it with DNP students in her Quality and Safety in Healthcare Systems graduate nursing course.
Ten years ago, Smith, a nurse practitioner, froze as a disgruntled patient turned away at the pharmacy stormed through a clinic door and unleashed a tirade of verbal assaults. Though unhurt and experienced in caring for people with addiction, Smith and fellow staff members were shaken. The organization brushed off the incident.
These years later, she uses the story to talk about safety with students, part of an AACN Essentials-driven lesson in safety that hits a little different.
“This isn’t a safety lesson about a time when a nurse gave the wrong drug,” Smith explained, “and it’s not made up. It’s really a case that helps us think about how an organization can show they value safety in how they respond.”
She’s presented other novel lessons in the Health Policy and Finances graduate course she teaches, too, from developing budgets using real data for fictitious projects to boost state vaccination rates to showing videos of Virginia General Assembly testimonies (including some of her own) and asking students to critique.
“I say, ‘I promise you won’t hurt my feelings,’” said Smith. “Maybe there’s someone who goes on and on and on, or someone who repeats everything the last person said. How can we change our pitch on the fly and really craft persuasive arguments for whatever it is we’re advocating for? A lot of that begins with listening and watching both good and bad examples. We also discuss a lot about how to, as an advocate, talk about paying for what it is you want.”
Three years ago, Smith first overhauled her DNP courses by infusing each with lessons guided by the AACN Essentials’ 10 domains, which ensure American nursing students emerge well-prepared and practice-ready. Each semester since, she continues to refresh and reshape the courses, adding new activities, assignments, and color to build on asynchronous lessons (many of which come from national organizations such as the Institute for Healthcare Improvement and the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality) for the roughly monthly in-person DNP classes that gather.
Alongside what’s new is, notably, what’s not: An emphasis on group activities and projects. Crucial lessons in economics and budgeting. And students’ frank assessment of one another with a growth mindset: How persuasive was their presentation? How organized is their PowerPoint? Was their argument convincing? What did they do well—and what might’ve been better?
“You can’t build a course and turn it on each semester,” Smith said. “You’ve got to keep it fresh.”
Alongside what’s new is, notably, what’s not: An emphasis on group activities and projects. Crucial lessons in economics and budgeting. And students’ frank assessment of one another with a growth mindset: How persuasive was their presentation? How organized is their PowerPoint? Was their argument convincing? What did they do well—and what might’ve been better?
In the Health Policy and Finances course, they hold debates. Formally argue for or against legislation. They hold a mock congress with assigned roles as citizens, legislators, or bureaucrats. Last semester, they debated legislation protecting patients’ right to die. Less important than the final tally of votes was the process.
Said one student to Smith, “I didn’t change my vote for medical aid in dying, but the class helped change my perspective.”
That’s high praise to Smith. It’s less about standing up and saying what you think, she said, or learning whether someone’s red or blue than about listening to one another.
“That’s the goal. One person flexed their opinion on something and realized, ‘I don’t know everything. The class doesn’t know everything.’ Mission accomplished,” Smith said.
###
Goal 1 - Transform educational offerings to meet the changing needs of our students, the Commonwealth, and society
Growing competition coupled with increased demand from prospective students, working nurses, and employers, make it critical that we adjust how, where, and what we teach. With a growing array of technology, and an increasingly tech-savvy student and faculty community, there has never been a better time to improve our content and delivery systems to remain dynamic, relevant, responsive—and growing.