Managing student practicum requirements is always a challenge for tertiary institutions and service providers. Getting it right so that students have a well-supported learning experience but numbers don’t overwhelm the practice partners requires skilled negotiation at all levels. In 2013, Wintec had 2370 placements to arrange amongst 139 clinical providers for 795 nursing students and the equivalent of 2 full time equivalent staff members to make it happen. The placements were geographically spread across the greater Waikato region from Coromandel to Taumarunui and were with a mix of Waikato DHB and private providers. Students were allocated placements by staff with little choice. There were acres of spreadsheets, students were often disgruntled, allocations needed to be at DHB 8 weeks before needed, it was time consuming.
Automating the clinical placement process had been on discussed previously after much discussion the Student Allocator module (SAM) developed by Scientia was chosen by Wintec to integrate with plans for software and timetabling management.
Since late 2013 bachelor of nursing students at Wintec have selected their clinical placements using student allocator, out talk will cover the process to implement the project and the strengthening relationships between Wintec and Waikato DHB to continue management and development of SAM to support student learning experience in clinical placement.