What did the Nursing Times survey tell us?

The Nursing Times survey (reported on 27th April) seemed to reveal some quite shocking statistics about mentors passing students who they wanted to fail.  Then, on the 11th May it was reported that the Nursing and Midwifery Council (NMC) will take "immediate action" to address the concerns the survey raised.

The front line of this action entails writing to the directors of nursing in all NHS trusts and all deans in the universities and the commisioners of the education programmes to take immediate action and remind everyone involved of their responsibilities. While this is a useful first step, one wonders whether this will have the desired effect, which is presumably to ensure that students receive adequate support in their practice placements and have a fair and accurate assessment of their achievements. 

The job that mentors have to do to support and assess students is incredibly complex and in my opinion is severely underestimated when you consider the lack of time they have in which to do the work and the lack of formal or informal recognition they seem to have from their employers of the difficult job they do.
Those who do it very well can contribute a lot to our overall understanding of just what it takes to be a skilful facilitator of learning and a fair and just assessor who can really tell who you can trust to progress towards entry to the professional register and who you can't.