Comparison of performance evaluation methods of nursing students in clinical training

Clinical evaluation of university students is highly correlated with their acquisition of skill. Clinical evaluation of nursing students is the important and often complex responsibility of nursing trainers. The present study was conducted aiming at comparing the methods of the evaluation of nursing student's performance.

This descriptive-comparative study was conducted in 2006. The population under study was the last-semester undergraduates studying at nursing faculties of two medical sciences universities A and B in Tehran. 105 students were selected (20 Medical Sciences "A" and 85 of Medical Sciences "B") using purposive sampling method and included in the study. Data gathering tool was researcher-made questionnaire. Data was analyzed using SPSS13 software and using descriptive and inferential statistics. Chi square test, Fisher's exact test and independent T-test were used.

There was a significant difference between two universities regarding the evaluation of students performance by student presence, explaining the criteria of clinical performance evaluation at the beginning of the course, adjustment of the criteria of accessing to the educational objectives with student, providing information of scores resulting from student's clinical performance evaluation, using the evaluation itself, assessment of the ability of student before beginning of the semester, observing the student's behavior during the implementation of the procedure and preparing and setting the criteria of accessing to the educational objectives by clinical trainers.

95% of students at the medical sciences university "A" considers the clinical evaluation process traditional and 5% considers it new, while at the medical sciences university "B", 41.18% of students considers the evaluation method traditional and 58.82% considers it new. Moreover, there is a statistical significant difference between the clinical evaluation approaches of two universities.