The NMC Standards for Education and Training (updated 2023) replaced the NMC Standards to Support Learning and Assessment and students on pre and post registration programmes are now supervised and assessed whilst in practice learning environments. As a result of this change, the roles of mentor, sign-off mentor, practice teacher and teacher have been replaced with three new roles: the practice supervisor, practice assessor and academic assessor.
Information on the three new roles can be found in The National Framework for Practice Supervisors, Practice Assessors and Academic Assessors in Scotland (NES, 2019) and also NMC Supporting Information – What do practice supervisors do?, What do practice assessors do? and What do academic assessors do? However, you will find a summary below.
Practice Supervisors
As a practice supervisor of student nurses and midwives you will:
- Serve as a role model for safe and effective practice in line with the NMC (2018) Code of Conduct.
- Support learning in line with your scope of practice, enabling students to meet their skills and proficiencies.
- Keep your own knowledge and practice up to date in the areas where you provide support, supervision and feedback.
- Provide timely feedback on student progress towards achieving their skills and proficiencies.
- Contribute to the student’s record of achievement by recording relevant observation of their practice.
- Have sufficient opportunity to engage with practice assessors and academic assessors to share relevant observations on student performance in practice.
- Appropriately raise and respond to student conduct and competency concerns and seek support when doing so.
Practice Assessors
As practice assessor of student nurses and midwives you will:
- Have previous working knowledge of supporting and assessing students’ performance in practice
- Are suitably prepared in supporting learning and assessment in practice and have a working knowledge of the students learning and achievement in theory.
- Conduct assessments to confirm student achievement of proficiencies and programme outcomes for practice learning, including periodic observation of the student across a range of environments.
- Make assessment decisions informed by feedback provided by the students practice supervisors and academic assessor.
- Record objective, evidence based assessment on student performance from a range of sources.
- Keep your own knowledge and practice up-to-date in the areas where you are providing support, supervision, feedback and assessment.
- Work in partnership with the nominated academic assessor to review the student performance prior to recommending progression in the programme.
Academic Assessors
The academic assessor works with a nominated practice assessor to make recommendations for progression for the student they are assigned to. They collate and confirm the student’s academic and practice learning outcomes for the part of the part of the programme they are assigned to the student, before recommending them for progression on to the next part of the programme.
The three roles undertaking the supervision and assessment of student nurses and midwives