The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper

The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper

Ethical Issues

Assignment

Students will be assigned a scenario with an ethical/legal issue involving evaluation and testing and write a paper (3-4 pages) discussing ethical principles/legal issues, evaluation process, and methods to prevent and resolve ethical/legal issues. This is an individual assignment. Please remember to give an overview of the scenario and add a conclusion to the end of the paper.
Due to limited funding and lack of mannequins, a nurse educator required students to demonstrate insertion of intravenous lines, indwelling catheters, and nasogastric tubes on their fellow classmates. The demonstration counted 50% of the students’ health assessment course grade. One student declined to participate. The student failed the course and was unable to progress in the nursing program The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper.

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Educational testing and assessment are critical components of nursing education. An emphasis on standardized achievement tests has made testing and assessment take on a prominent role in the education system. Nursing and other professional disciplines have been under pressure to account for the quality of education programs and their practitioners’ competence. Therefore, assessments and tests have been used as proof of competency and quality. However, with the increasing use of tests and assessments, there have been concerns about the fairness and suitability of the testing systems. Also, nurse educators are concerned about the legal issues that arise in working with students in clinical settings and the classroom. This essay discusses the ethical and legal issues relating to the use of assessments and tests in nursing education.

Assessment entails forming judgment on a student’s attainment of knowledge and skills in a given course. Each course of study has assessment tasks which make up an evaluation scheme for the program. The evaluation scheme should conform to some educational, ethical, and regulatory principles. On educational principles, the assessment should promote learning and reinforce previous learning. Assessment should incorporate both formative and summative aspects. Also, the timing and amount of assessment should be organized to facilitate deep learning. An assessment should adhere to ethical principles of fairness, transparency, and non-discriminatory. The assessment process should allow students to demonstrate achievement of learning outcomes (Glasgow, 2019)The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper . Learners should be made aware of assessment requirements and modalities to use if they need to appeal against an assessment decision. On regulatory principles, the assessment process should conform to the institution’s policies, procedures, and guidance.

The scenario entails a nurse educator who required students to demonstrate insertion of intravenous lines, indwelling catheters, and nasogastric tubes on their fellow classmates due to a lack of mannequins and limited funding. The demonstration accounted for 50% of the health assessment course grade. A student declined to participate, failed the course, and was unable to progress with the program. The ethical issue arising from the scenario is whether the assessment was fair and equitable. The legal question that arises is whether the student’s rights were violated. Ethical standards in testing and assessment are necessary for the promotion and regulation of professional behavior (Ferrara et al., 2019). Several ethical issues that arise in the testing and assessment of students are the fairness of the assessment and testing policies, the applicability and transportability of tests, culturally competent career assessment practice, and confidentiality (Glasgow, 2019)The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper . Nurse educators should ensure they provide students with responsible assessment practices by having consensus on ethical practices based on testing.

Many educational institutions operate without consensus on assessment delivery and creation. The policies that shape assessment practice for many institutions lack clear guidelines that can help nurse educators understand and embrace ethical assessment principles. The nurse educator is legally required to test all the students in the same way and using the same materials (Huston, 2021). The student’s refusal to participate in the test created an ethical dilemma for the nurse educator. The student is within their rights to refuse to participate in the demonstration, considering that it involves human subjects (other students). Research ethics and principles require a researcher to respect the participant’s autonomy. Therefore, an individual should not be induced to participate in a study or a demonstration. The demonstration testing is meant to serve all students and is not modified for the individual needs of specific students. On the other hand, a nursing student is required to acquire skills and be conversant with the insertion of IV lines since it is a part of a nurse’s routine work. A nurse educator was within their rights, as required by the institution’s policy, to fail the student in the health assessment course (Glasgow, 2019)The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper . The reason for the student’s refusal to participate in the demonstration has not been disclosed. Therefore, it is difficult to give a verdict on the specific ethical violations.

Nurse educators are required to follow a code of ethics, health and safety guidelines, employer policies, and legal regulations. They are also obligated to ensure that students adhere to sane legal and ethical standards in nursing education. Nurse educators are legally obligated to ensure their students do not injure themselves or patients. They are required to evaluate their students to ensure they meet the clinical requirements. If a student is not meeting the clinical requirements and causes harm, the nurse educator can be held legally liable (Huston, 2021). The nurse educators are also liable if they are found to be negligent in student supervision or if they assign tasks above the student level. Learning about IV insertion is a clinical requirement for nursing students (Jeffries, 2020)The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper . If the nurse educator had explained to the students why they had to use fellow students for demonstration and supervised them, then they are not legally liable for the student’s failure to participate. For a nurse educator to be held legally liable, it must be proven that the student acted under the supervision of the educator. In addition, it must be proven that standards and procedures were neglected by both parties and that harm caused to the patient was a direct result of the nurse educator’s negligence (Ferrara et al., 2019). If the educator can prove that the demonstration task was at par with the student’s skill level, then there is no legal liability. If the student’s rights were not violated on the grounds of race, gender, violation of due process, or unfairness, then the nurse educator was legally entitled to fail the student in the health assessment course. In summary, educational testing and assessment should be done within the confines of ethical principles and legal standards.

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References

Ferrara, S., Maxey-Moore, K., & Brookhart, S. M. (2019). Guidance in the Standards for Classroom Assessment: Useful or Irrelevant?. In Classroom assessment and educational measurement (pp. 97-119). Routledge.

Glasgow, M. E. S., Dreher, H. M., & Schreiber, J. (2019). Standardized testing in nursing education: Preparing students for NCLEX-RN® and practice. Journal of Professional Nursing35(6), 440-446.

Huston, C. (2021). Professional issues in nursing: Challenges and opportunities.

Jeffries, P. (2020). Simulation in nursing education: From conceptualization to evaluation. Lippincott Williams & Wilkins The Testing And Assessment In Nursing Education Essay Paper