Student placement experience transformation project

The Student Placement Experience Transformation project has been created for health and social care providers in London and Hertfordshire who are interested in becoming a nurse training establishment.

The project aims to recruit and manage nursing and healthcare student placement opportunities in health and social care organisations with a view to providing good quality placements that will benefit both the students and the practice environment.

Benefits of the project

When you become a training centre for healthcare students a learning process is formed in which professionals in the organisation learn together by working side-by-side and communicating on a regular basis.

This learning leads to a natural progression and recruitment of qualified nurses with the necessary skills to start employment in a similar organisation in the future.

Students say that doing a placement has helped them gain insight into the area they would like to pursue in their career after they graduate.

Mentors working with students say that a student nurse helps them to keep up-to-date and that they enjoy the experience of daily discussions with students about the principles of delivering patient care.

How it works

Each health and social care provider that joins the project commits to providing a student placement job for about 4-6 weeks. The healthcare/nurse student is appointed to a certain number of learning opportunities and meetings during their placement and is supervised by a mentor within the provider.

The practical aspects and clinical skills are then supported by reflective sessions at the University where the students get the chance to report and analyse their experiences from placements. In this way they build their knowledge about roles and responsibilities and how their role as graduates at the end of their course is aligned and complemented with that of the other professions.

Mentors in the GP practice will be responsible for devising suitable learning opportunities that will be of benefit to both students and the practice team. They will also share and discuss the outcomes of these learning opportunities with the students so that a bond is formed between theory and practice.

We can support you

The University's representatives working with you have long standing experience in issues relating to supporting students in vocational placements. Those clinical areas which have started to support healthcare students have reported that the student adds to the vigour, dynamism and also the reputation of their clinical area as a training establishment.