Perceptions and Attitudes of Nursing Students’ Transition to Remote Instruction During Covid-19

Higher education institutions suddenly transitioned from face-to-face to remote learning environments during the outbreak of the COVID-19 Pandemic. Nursing is a discipline that thrives on skills and direct personal communication. Undergraduate nursing students were not prepared for professional training via an online modality. Although they were considered a digital generation, taking nursing courses online was different from generic electronic device use. Shifting to a remote learning environment also meant the loss of face-to-face clinical training and opportunities to practice skills in a “hands-on” manner. Nursing students were left with concerns regarding their ability to perform skills adequately and to find a job after graduating. This chapter includes two studies that were designed to help us to better understand nursing students’ experience with technology and their perceptions of readiness during remote learning. The first study uses the extended technology acceptance model (ETAM) to explore undergraduate nursing students’ perceptions of the levels of technology competency, self-management, self-efficacy, usefulness of remote learning management system (LMS), ease of use of LMS, attitude toward LMS, intention and actual use of LMS, and their expected grades. Results indicated that as faculty adjusted their teaching methods to using remote technologies, undergraduate nursing students were challenged to increase their self-management behaviors. However, they may have also gained confidence in their technical competence by taking greater ownership and responsibility for their learning. The second study explores how students perceived their readiness in clinical training and if this changed after their first semester, before an instructional nursing skills camp, and after the camp ended. The results revealed that students’ overall perceptions of readiness in performing the skills required for their first clinical service were significantly higher after completing the bootcamp. Taken together, educators and researchers can use the obtained information from each study to help ensure that nursing students are successful in their programs, whether they are in-person or remote.