Have you ever applied for a position in academic nursing education, only to find that in addition to your curriculum vitae (CV) and cover letter you also need to provide the prospective employer with your teaching philosophy? Many new applicants for roles in higher education struggle with this task. Most have never written a teaching philosophy before, and an online search for guidance results in little direction specific to nursing. Consider these tips for writing a succinct teaching philosophy for the role of academic nurse educator (ANE).
Your CV captures your education and work background, often expressed through a cover letter, but your teaching philosophy should capture the essence of who you are, or who you plan to be, as an educator. Your teaching philosophy demonstrates to prospective employers how you approach your role as a nurse educator responsible for facilitating student learning. Your teaching philosophy is less about selling yourself with what you have professionally accomplished in various roles, and more about selling yourself with regard to what you’ll bring as an educator to the student learning experience.
When writing your teaching philosophy, your goal is to sell your value as an educator and the unique qualities and attributes you intend to share with students. In your current role, you may excel at interprofessional collaboration or have been evaluated as an effective communicator because of your ability to have crucial conversations. Maybe you’ve successfully demonstrated informal or formal leadership skills. All amazing and wonderful qualities as a nursing professional. However, these attributes speak to you individually and fail to capture how you’ll facilitate the student learning experience.
Instead, focus on how you aim to support student acquisition of knowledge. Will you tell students what they need to know by directly engaging with them? Or will you lead students in the direction of answers but leave it to them to find them? How do you anticipate meeting the unique needs of individual learners with various and diverse backgrounds? How will you promote a learning experience that acknowledges the unique characteristics of your learners? We’ve all been in the student role, draw on those experiences to help you define the type of ANE you intend to be (or not be).
ANEs bring a plethora of skill sets to students, but it’s how we translate those skills into our teaching to facilitate learning that makes nursing education a unique professional role. Celebrate and praise your strengths, but also acknowledge your known or perceived weaknesses. Then speak to how you plan to address or have already addressed those weaknesses. Discuss how you’ll facilitate learning, your expectations for how students will receive information, and how you’ll support them in their academic pursuit of nursing. Ultimately, you want the reader of your teaching philosophy to want to be your student.
If you’re a new ANE and still unsure of what you bring to the student learning experience and how to best capture your teaching philosophy in writing, remember, this isn’t your first time teaching. You’ve taught many patients. Reflect on the strategies you implemented to empower those patients to learn and achieve with their health. You’ll likely bring those same (positive and negative) attributes to the student learning experience, which will contribute to the foundation of your role as an ANE.
Maria Mackey, PhD, DNP, RN, CNE, is an Associate Professor of Nursing at East Stroudsburg University of Pennsylvania.
