Preceptors
You have knowledge to share. We have students who are eager to learn.
Our preceptor program generates tangible benefits for everyone involved. Students gain real-world experience that’s only available in a clinical setting. Preceptors inspire the next generation of nurses while gaining access to College of Nursing resources. And our faculty is strengthened through the working relationships they develop with leading clinicians.
- Adult Gerontology Acute Care Nurse Practitioner
- Adult Gerontology Primary Care Nurse Practitioner
- Family Nurse Practitioner
- Neonatal Nurse Practitioner
- Nurse Midwifery
- Pediatric Acute Care Nurse Practitioner
- Pediatric Primary Care Nurse Practitioner
- Psychiatric-Mental Health Nurse Practitioner
- Women’s Health Nurse Practitioner
Requirements
- Preceptors must have at least one year of experience in their population-focused field.
- The College of Nursing will need an Educational Affiliation Agreement with your site.
- We will need a copy of your CV or resume.
Become a preceptor
As a preceptor, you are a role model, mentor and teacher for the next generation of advanced practice nurses and clinical nurse leaders.
Benefits
Eligibility criteria: Any provider/preceptor that has worked with an Ohio State nursing student for clinical hours over the last two years; also available to prospective preceptors and clinical site contacts
Benefits*
- Free CEs
- Advanced Practice Provider Updates
- Up to 20 Nursing Contact Hours
- Up to 10 Pharmacology Hours
- APP Advocacy and Law Updates
- 1.21 Category A CEs
- Tips and Tools for Preceptors
- 1.34 Nursing Contact Hours
- Other CEs:
- Bridging the Gap: Enhancing LGBTQ+ Awareness and Competency
- 1.2 Nursing Contact Hours
- SPEACS-2: Community Skills Training
- 1.0 Nursing Contact Hours
- Providing Virtual Care through Telehealth
- 1.48 Nursing Contact Hours
- Preparing the RN in Primary Care to Engage in Policy and Advocacy
- 2.0 Legal Nursing Contact Hours
- Innovative Practices in Transitional Care Management
- 2.16 Nursing Contact Hours
- and more
- Bridging the Gap: Enhancing LGBTQ+ Awareness and Competency
- Advanced Practice Provider Updates
- Participation in raffles for Ohio State football and basketball tickets and other Ohio State events and conferences
- Documentation of your precepted hours for professional development, such as APRN specialty re-certification, clinical ladder or annual review.
Eligibility criteria: Preceptors are eligible for a Non-Salaried Adjunct Faculty Appointment after their first successful semester precepting an Ohio State nurse practitioner student. Preceptors must complete the adjunct faculty appointment process and commit to precepting an Ohio State advance practice nursing student for one full semester at least once annually. Adjunct appointments are active for three (3) years and may be renewed for additional three (3) year terms thereafter provided that precepting requirement is met.
Benefits*
- Adjunct faculty title with Ohio State College of Nursing (inclusion in directory)
- Adjunct Instructor of Clinical Practice (for preceptors that are MS prepared)
- Adjunct Assistant Professor of Clinical Practice (for preceptors that are doctorally prepared)
- Access to Ohio State's Health Sciences Library and online resources including UpToDate, VisualDX, PubMed and more
- Ohio State football and basketball tickets**
- Our goal is to send each adjunct faculty preceptor that is interested in Ohio State Athletics to a game at least once during the term of their three-year appointment.
- LinkedIn Learning - Free Professional Development Courses
- Use your Ohio State email (name.#@osu.edu) to access over 18,000 courses covering a range of technical, business, software and creative topics.
- Opportunities to attend Ohio State Educational Events
- including OSUWMC APP Conference, National Summit on Promoting Well-being and Resilience in Healthcare Professionals, and more
- Complimentary registration for KySS Mental Health Fellowship: Child and Adolescent
- 40.39 nursing and 5.65 pharmacology contact hours
- $945 value
- Gift cards and recognition for service and life events (weddings, births, retirement)
*DISCLAIMER: The Ohio State University College of Nursing is not privy to internal HR policies of our clinical site partners. Please check with your employer to ensure there is no conflict of interest or HR policy that would preclude you from participating in our preceptor benefits program.
**Ohio State adjunct faculty preceptors are not eligible to purchase Ohio State football or basketball tickets at the Ohio State employee discounted rate. Ohio State athletics tickets are limited and we cannot help preceptors with season tickets or additional tickets beyond the tickets we have allocated for our preceptor benefits program each year. Our goal is to send each adjunct faculty preceptor that is interested in Ohio State Athletics to a game at least once during the term of their three-year appointment.
Responsibilities
The APRN STUDENT holds the primary responsibility of communicating with the program faculty and clinical preceptor in preparation for and throughout the clinical experience rotation. The student is responsible for meeting all institutional and clinical practice site health and regulatory requirements to include confidentiality, HIPPA, security clearance as required by each clinical site. Students share their learning needs and objectives of the clinical experience that is approved by the program faculty. (AACN, 2018).
Please work with your designated clinical faculty member to help the student improve skills, accomplish and set goals as well as express any concerns (including performance and professionalism) any time during the clinical experience. The designated clinical faculty member will complete a site visit with you and the student via phone, in person or virtually and will want to discuss student progress with you.
Our clinical faculty have the responsibility of ensuring that the graduate nursing student acquires the content and competencies required, and that all program outcomes are met. Faculty will clearly communicate to the clinical preceptor the level, the intended clinical progression and outcome objectives for the clinical rotation of the student during each clinical rotation experience, thus affording the student meaningful clinical experiences that will develop the students’ comfort in practice and clinical competency.
Providing a student with honest, timely feedback is an important preceptor role. For the majority of student-preceptor pairings, this responsibility is a component of an ongoing, daily dialogue that includes challenges to critical thinking, debriefing of difficult clinical scenarios, and/or discussion of the professional role. One tip that we would like to share: tell the student that you are providing feedback by actually saying, “Let me provide some feedback,” as studies have shown that this allows the student to prioritize and remember your comments.
Sometimes honest feedback requires more difficult conversations, especially if the student is unaware of their own learning needs, overly confident, consistently inaccurate in management decisions, or fails to meet clinical expectations. When more difficult feedback is given and the student either doesn’t receive it well or doesn’t improve, please contact clinical faculty and share this evaluation. For novice (and experienced) preceptors who would like additional guidance regarding how to provide more difficult feedback, please refer to the resources listed and/or ask clinical faculty for their thoughts, suggestions and assistance. We appreciate the mentorship that you are providing to our students, and we want to share in providing valuable feedback to students about their clinical progress.
The College of Nursing utilizes Re-Val, our HIPAA-compliant clinical tracking and management system, to document all graduate nursing students’ precepted clinical experiences. Re-Val serves as an integrated platform that maintains students’ clinical time logs, skill and procedure documentation, case logs and competency progression across their clinical rotations.
Preceptors verify students’ clinical hours and complete both a midterm and end-of-semester evaluation in Re-Val each semester. These evaluations, along with faculty assessments, help to determine whether a student’s overall clinical performance is satisfactory. Students cannot receive a final course grade until all preceptor evaluations have been submitted.
Preceptors will receive an email from Re-Val with login instructions. Once logged in, preceptors are asked to approve students’ clinical time logs and complete the midterm and end-of-semester evaluations.
FAQ
Preceptors must have at least one year of experience in their population-focused field and have the capacity to mentor students for 1-3 days each week, with some flexibility in scheduling.
- Each site must fill out an Affiliation Agreement and it must be finalized by the site and the College of Nursing.
- Provide a copy of your CV or resume, or complete the Graduate Preceptor Data Form.
- You will be assigned a designated clinical faculty member as your point of contact for the semester based on your specialty certification and practice.
Precepting students is similar to precepting new employees. However, because students are still learning they will not have the competencies and self-assurance of a new nurse practitioner. Students will need guidance, direction, mentorship and support, especially in the beginning.
Preceptors must complete both a midterm and end-of-semester evaluation each semester. Students are in the clinical setting to learn and are not expected to have the highest marks. The feedback is used to determine weaknesses and strengths so the clinical instructor and preceptor can work together to ensure that the student is progressing as intended. Assessing clinical competency is a shared responsibility with clinical faculty.
Yes. We want to help and support you in your role as a preceptor and you may call us at any time. If you find a student is having difficulty, would like to discuss student progress, need to have a difficult discussion, or just have a question or concern, please contact your assigned clinical faculty member.
A list of course and clinical objectives will be provided to you so that you are able to guide student clinical experiences. Our preference is for graduate nursing students to be involved with all aspects of patient care. While observation is important, clinical skills and abilities are learned best in environments that allow students the opportunities to provide hands-on assessments. Level of involvement should occur with the preceptor’s input and judgement. By the time the student has completed all clinical hours for the clinical program, he or she should be able to conduct appropriate, clinically-sound patient care consistent with a novice in practice.
Preceptors will be provided with formal documentation of their precepted hours for the College of Nursing at the end of each semester. Check your specialty renewal certification requirements. Many count hours of student precepting toward renewal requirements. Please see the benefits section for information about free CEs available to preceptors.