Anne Ravanelli, “Community-Based Learning in Nursing Education”
Mentor: Anne Dressel, Nursing
Poster #126

Nurses are vital to the health of the community. Recently, the American Nursing Association updated their competencies to involve teaching nurses about the social determinants of health in order to become community leaders in health promotion. Our study seeks to understand how nursing student involvement in a community-based research and education project about indoor air quality in childcare centers helped nursing students and other healthcare professionals reach their population health learning goals. Nursing students involved in the project completed a community health assessment and created infographics guided by the social determinants of health. The Social Determinants of Health are the geographical, social, economic, and environmental conditions in which people work, study, and play. Given this framework, environmental health involves not only pollution, but also safety in a neighborhood, reliable transportation, fresh food accessibility, and safe and affordable housing. A nurse must understand the social determinants of health that a population experiences in order to effect longstanding change. We administered a survey to 20 nursing students and 9 medical students, asking questions to find out what they learned about a nurse’s role in relation to population health and their overall experience. We used qualitative analysis to code the survey results, which yielded five overall themes: Nurses as Community-based Practitioners, Nurses as Researchers, Nurses as Educators, Nurses as Reflexive Thinkers, and Nurses as Advocates. Preliminary results show that most students gained many valuable skills and new insights into population health, including a newfound understanding of their role as community advocates and health researchers capable of influencing public policy. In particular, their involvement in the research project provided them with an in-depth community-based learning experience and tools to become advocates and systems-thinkers. The results imply a need for continued adaptation of nursing and medical school curriculums to better foster community health.