Susan Bindon and Kari Schmidt: The JNPD "Transition to Practice" column will feature an expanded focus on enhancing multidimensional aspects of nurses making a transition to practice. Nurse residencies are a major focus for many nursing professional development (NPD) practitioners. These programs focus on new graduate nurses' transition from academics to the practice setting. Transition to practice includes the transition not only for new graduate nurses but also for experienced nurses returning to the workplace or transitioning to a new role, practice setting, or specialty.
As co-editors for the Journal for Nurses in Professional Development, we are pleased to announce that this column will be edited by Dr. Maryann Windey. In the upcoming columns, Dr. Windey will share evidence-based practice and practical approaches to support and facilitate these various transitions to practice. Dr. Windey shares her background and vision for the column in the following paragraphs. We welcome her insights and contribution to JNPD!
Maryann Windey: I am delighted and honored to be appointed editor of the new "Transition to Practice" column! I have been passionate about transition-to-practice issues since I first began my nursing career over 20 years ago. My interest started first as a terrified new graduate and then, in 2003, as a new nursing professional development (NPD) educator and director. For the last 7 years, I have been fully immersed in all aspects of a large healthcare organization's robust nurse residency for newly licensed nurses and experienced transitioning nurses. I have been able to share my organization's residency challenges and outcomes through numerous publications and national presentations, including a systematic review on interventions to develop preceptors. My work assisting with the editing of the Association for Nurses in Professional Development's new publication, Leadership in Nursing Professional Development: An Organizational Focus; serving as an evaluator for a residency accrediting body; and acting as a JNPD editorial board member, past book reviewer, and manuscript reviewer has helped me understand the struggles and challenges NPD practitioners experience related to transition programs.
My vision for this column is to provide overviews of relevant, evidenced-based strategies and offer practical advice from the experts for the NPD practitioner who is tasked with effectively transitioning newly licensed and experienced nurses into new specialties. Topics may range from further defining the resident program manager role to accreditation standards, dissemination of program evaluations, and effective instructional modalities. Most importantly, I envision this column to be about topics important to you! If there are topics that you would like to read more about regarding transition-to-practice issues, please e-mail me at mailto:[email protected].