Learning to be professional

I'm preparing a paper for a conference organised by the University of Surrey's Centre for Excellence in Professional Training and Education (SCEPTrE). The main theme is 'learning to be professional' and I think my research has a lot to contribute, in that it provides the part of the story that depicts the experiences of the professionals who directly support learners in the workplace. They have their own idea of what it is to be professional and go to some length to instill professional skills and behaviour in their students.

Although it feels like early days yet (last data was collected at the end of January), interrogating the data with both the research question and the conference theme in mind has brought out some intriguing themes: working with fragments of experience; being aware of high stakes; having hope for the profession. Both mentors and students work with fragments of experience. The mentor sees a fragment of a student’s learning journey and has to imagine where and how it fits with their image of a professional nurse, in addition to helping the students connect their experiences. The stakes are high for mentors and their students. There is urgency about learning, and mentors can be subject to persistent questioning or find themselves striving to ‘unlock’ a quiet student. The accounts reveal how when a relationship is under tension, there is a range of emotional responses. Underlying a decision about a student’s aptitude to become a nurse is a poignant reality-check: would I want this person caring for me or my family? Hope for the profession extended to concern and optimism for the future and recognition of the importance of the mentor role.

I'm looking forward to the conference and to having some fruitful discussions about how what I'm doing complements some of the excellent work already done in the field of work-based and professional learning, such as by Stephen Billet and Michael Eraut.