| The nursing faculty shortage, with a concomitant nursing shortage, has implications for the future of healthcare. Approximately, 50% of nursing faculty members in the United States are prepared at the master's level, while some areas (i.e. Mississippi) have significantly higher proportions of nursing faculty members, who are not prepared at the doctoral level. Previously, nursing leaders and researchers directed attention of nursing research towards a focus on clinical problems, while research on nursing education has largely been ignored. A plethora of research examined how new faculty in academia perceive the process of socialization. Additionally, nursing literature reported numerous studies regarding the socialization of undergraduate nursing students. Few studies, however, have focused on the experience of master's students in the nursing educator role. This study investigated the socialization experiences in master's degree nursing education programs, as perceived by students in their final semester or recently graduated master's students in nursing education. In-depth interviews were conducted with 15 completing or recent graduates of a master's nursing programs in one southern state. The phenomenological approach was used to collect and analyze data. Nineteen themes and one pattern, "Learning to Juggle", emerged in the data analyses. |
