Thank you for partnering with Daytona State College School of Nursing in our quest to prepare registered nursing students for their future. Please review the following powerpoint presentation to aquaint you with the goals, objectives and guidelines for this program.

1. Transition from student to RN
Daytona State College
Associate Degree
Nursing Program

2. Thank you for volunteering your
time as a preceptor
• Please review these PowerPoint slides before
the beginning of the preceptorship. They are
intended to refresh you as to how it felt as you
finished nursing school and began your new
career. The questions are meant to help you
reflect. You do not need to formally respond to
them. Students are excited to be learning from
you and appreciate you sharing your expertise.

3. Terrified or just scared!!
• Students have experienced:
• Many role models throughout clinicals
• Variety of clinical settings
• Volumes of information
• Every person’s experience was different
• Everyone’s personalities are different
• Learning styles are different
• Cultural influences play a part

4. Preceptorship
For final semester
registered nurse students

5. Scenario
• Pamela is a final semester student of DSC’s
ADN program and was assigned to precept on
3E. You are her assigned preceptor. You are
short staffed today; Pamela’s first day with you.
You are assigned 8 patients and feel
overwhelmed. You explain the situation to
Pamela and ask that she do basic care today as
you truly will not have time to spend teaching
her.

6. Discussion
• Pamela agrees to do whatever you have asked
to help out but then asks, “How would you have
handled this if I wasn’t here? That is one thing
that I need to learn.”
• What will your response be?
• How will your plan for the day change based on
this question?

7. Continuing on
• You have now decided to have Pamela follow
you and observe how you assess, plan,
prioritize, delegate, evaluate, etc. You survive a
very busy day.
• At the end of the day Pamela asks if she could
make the plan for the day tomorrow after you
review your assignments.

8. Discussion
• You feel that you have had no time to teach
Pamela anything. What would your best
response to her enthusiastic request be?
• How do you think Pamela is feeling about her
preceptorship experience so far?

9. Group Discussion
• Try to think back to when you were a new grad.
Did you have any confidence?
• Did you feel as if you knew anything?
• Did you feel slow and clumsy and disorganized?
• Did you want to please your colleagues?
• What best helped you to gain that confidence?
• Was hands on learning a re-inforcer or a
deterrent?

10. The Next Day
• Skeptically you allow Pamela to make the plan
for the day after you both listened to report. You
are amazed at the logic that Pamela has
demonstrated in her prioritizing and you discuss
this with her. She thanks you for being such a
good role model the previous day and for
encouraging her to use her critical thinking skills.
You are not sure you understand what she
means by that.

11. Discussion
• You thought you hadn’t taught her anything.
How do you feel now that you realize she is
watching every detail of what you do?
• Pamela tells you that she really needs help with
clinical reasoning and asks you how you keep
up with all the changing data for each patient
and how you know what to be watching for. How
will you respond?

12. Another day
• Pamela has now been working with you for 2
weeks. You have had some time to have a
discussion with her about what she feels is
important and what you feel is important to
become a professional nurse. You are surprised
to find that the technical tasks are the least
important to Pamela. She feels that she needs
the most help in learning how to get organized
and how to deal with difficult situations.

13. Discussion
• You know that Dr. Strong, who at times is aggressive,
will be in to see one of your patients. How will you
prepare Pamela to handle his personality?
• You are gowning up to enter your patient’s room who is
in strict isolation for MRSA in the sputum. You hear
voices and look up to see the surgeon shaking hands
with the pt. He turns to exit the room and is not wearing
any PPE and has not washed his hands. How will you
demonstrate patient advocacy to Pamela?

14. Yet Another day
• The night nurse, during shift report on a re-
admitted client, says, “He’s back again. He’s so
non-compliant, I don’t know why we bother with
him. He’s been nothing but a pain all night.”
Pamela tells you in confidence that she feels
that was an unprofessional and biased opinion
and shouldn’t be included in report.

15. Discussion
• You think to yourself, “This is the real world,
honey!”
• Is it?

16. The Last Day
• This is the last day that you will be working as
Pamela’s preceptor. She thanks you for all that
she has learned from you about how to handle
the role of being a professional registered nurse.
She is particularly grateful that your focus was
not just about how to do tasks.
• You realize that a little of the innocence has
rubbed off on you, too.