ANPD Call for Awards and Convention Scholarships Now Open

2016 ANPD Annual Convention Award Winners

Awards
Do you know a fellow ANPD member going above and beyond to contribute to the profession? ANPD presents prestigious awards recognizing excellence in nursing professional development. The awards have been redesigned to align with the new scope and standards in eight separate categories:

• Belinda E. Puetz Award
• This award encompasses overall pursuit of excellence. This excellence is shown through the recipient’s creativity, productivity, exemplary leadership qualities, and efficiency.
• Learning Facilitator Award
• The NPD practitioner uses the educational design process to bridge the knowledge, skills, and/or practice gaps identified through a needs assessment.
• Change Agent Award
• The NPD practitioner actively works to transform processes through inspiration, initiation, adoption, and sustainment of and adaption to change using project management and improvement processes at one of the following levels: patient care unit, education department, and organization.
• Mentor Award
• The NPD practitioner advances the profession by contributing to the professional development of others and supporting life-long learning as individuals develop across practice, professional and educational settings.
• Leader Award
• The NPD practitioner influences the interprofessional practice and learning environments, the NPD specialty, the profession of nursing, and healthcare.
• Champion for Scientific Inquiry Award
• The NPD practitioner promotes the generation and dissemination of new knowledge and the use of evidence to advance NPD practice, guide clinical practice, and improve patient care.
• Advocate for NPD Specialty Award
• The NPD practitioner actively supports, promotes, and demonstrates nursing professional development as a nursing practice specialty.
• Partner for Practice Transitions Award
• The NPD practitioner supports the transition of nurses and other healthcare team members across learning and practice environments, roles, and professional stages.

Visit the Awards and Scholarships page for a detailed guideline of nomination requirements. 

All nominations are due by Wednesday, March 15, 2017. Click here to nominate yourself or a colleague.

Scholarships

The Annual Convention Scholarship program provides members with an opportunity to attend this premier education and networking event. ANPD members with an interest in propelling their career by attending this valuable event are encouraged to apply.  

Visit the Awards and Scholarships page for a detailed guideline of application requirements. 

All applications are due by Wednesday, March 15, 2017. Click here if you are interested in applying for a 2017 Convention Scholarship.

Creating Bridges and Embracing Opportunities

Kari L. Schmidt, MS, RN-BC, ACC

©2015 Photograph by Rand Schmidt, used with permission. 

"What is the difference between an obstacle and an opportunity? Our attitude towards it. Every opportunity has a difficulty and every difficulty has an opportunity." —J. Sidlow Baxter

As I stop and reflect on 2016, I take pause. What an incredible year for our nursing professional development (NPD) specialty! I am truly in awe of the impact of ANPD and our members—the impact on nurses, patients and families.  We have embraced the opportunities unique to NPD. Dr. Susan Bindon challenged us in her closing address at the 2016 ANPD convention, “Building Bridges: One Question at a Time.” I reflect on continuing to meet that challenge and create bridges and embrace opportunities.

Through the leadership of Drs. Mary Harper and Patsy Maloney, our Nursing Professional Development: Scope and Standards of Practice, 3rd edition was published in July 2016. The Scope and Standards is the result of four task forces, evaluating the evidence that impacts our practice and guides us for the future. Input from ANPD members provided valuable feedback as the Scope and Standards were finalized. Significant changes to the Scope and Standards were featured in the opening session at the ANPD 2016 Annual Convention. Those of us who attended that session were also energized by the comments and call to action as Persephone Munnings of Princess Margaret Hospital in Nassau, Bahamas, and the University of The Bahamas, spoke during the comments portion of the session. Drs. Harper and Maloney shared insights and examples of practical application in the Scope and Standards of Practice column in the Journal for Nurses in Professional Development, beginning with the May/June 2016 issue. If you have not yet had the opportunity to read this column, I very much encourage you to do so—these are our standards.

I have the honor of facilitating some of our ANPD Certification Preparation Courses across the country. I met so many inspiring NPD practitioners last year, who approach their practice with enthusiasm and passion. I was humbled to see how course participants shared examples of how they apply evidence-based practice, and how they brainstormed ideas to help and support other participants—new colleagues they had just met, but would now have in their networks.

As Co-Editor with Dr. Susan Bindon for the Journal for Nurses in Professional Development, we see the research our NPD colleagues are conducting—literally across the globe. The 2-part series on return on investment for NPD has become core to planning for many of our NPD colleagues. This series was published in the May/June and July/August 2016 issues of the Journal. Dr. Bindon and I also have the opportunity to mentor new authors, and see their competence and confidence grow as they are actively engaged in the publishing process for the first time. Their enthusiasm energizes me.

The spirit of inquiry and collegiality at the 2016 convention, Aspire to Inspire, was amazing. In Pittsburgh, the city of bridges, I could see bridges being built in new professional relationships throughout convention. I attended the concurrent session featuring the panel of some of the authors for the ANPD text Leadership in Nursing Professional Development: An Organizational and System Focus. Again, I took pause at the wealth of expertise of the panel members. We truly were aspiring to inspire at convention.

As a charter member of ANPD, I am proud and humbled to be part of our NPD specialty and our organization. We continue to grow as a specialty—nurturing each other and advocating for our specialty. We will take that energy and expertise into 2017, and the 2017 ANPD Annual Convention as we Aspire to Transform. We will continue to create bridges and embrace opportunities.

References

Harper, M.G. & Maloney, P. (2016) Nursing professional development: Scope & standards of
     practice, 3^rd Ed.  Chicago: Association for Nursing Professional Development.

Opperman, C., Liebig, D., Bowling J., Johnson C.S. & Harper, M. (2016). Measuring return
     on investment for professional development activities: A review of evidence. Journal for
     Nursing Professional Development, 32(3), 122-129.

Opperman, C., Liebig, D., Bowling J., Johnson C.S. & Harper, M. (2016). Measuring return
     on investment for professional development activities:  Implications for practice. Journal
     for Nursing Professional Development, 32(4), 176-184.

Smith C.M. & Harper, M.G. (2016). Leadership in nursing professional development: An
     organizational and system focus. Chicago: Association for Nursing Professional
     Development.

Journey to Nursing Professional Development

Persephone Munnings, MSN, RN-BC, CM is Manager of the Continuing Nursing Education Department at Princess Margaret Hospital in Nassau, Bahamas, as well as Adjunct Nursing Faculty at the University of The Bahamas.

As a little girl growing up on the rural island of Mayaguana in The Bahamas, I observed the nurse as she delivered quality care to the residents throughout the island. Her skill and high level of professionalism fascinated me. I dreamed of one day being a nurse just like her and upon graduating from high school, I entered the nursing program at The College of The Bahamas.

I graduated with an Associate’s Degree from a rigorous nursing program and as a graduate nurse experienced a lack of mentorship with one of my clinical assignments. This moved me to mentor all nursing students who rotated through my ward. Working with the students ignited my passion for education and I returned to college to pursue a BSN which would qualify me for a faculty position at the local school of nursing.

Three years after obtaining my BSN degree, I began searching for a new assignment, a new job, a new challenge, a new level of fulfilment, something new. This search landed me in a meeting with the Principal Nursing Officer and a temporary deployment to the Continuing Nursing Education Department. It turned out that this assignment was my best one ever. In fact, it was the start of my journey to NPD certification. Up to this point I didn’t know much about continuing nursing education; so, I took to the internet seeking to augment the principles I had learned in the teaching and learning course in the BSN program. My research led me to the National Nursing Staff Development Organization’s (NNSDO) website which was a great resource. Further search led to a book by Barbara Brunt called Competencies for Staff Educators. This book became my go-to resource for my work within the department.

The NNSDO later became the Association for Nursing Professional Development. After following ANPD for a few years and realizing that the organization catered to the needs of nurses in staff development, I became a member in July 2015. Immediately I began accessing recorded webinars and registering for the upcoming sessions. Two months later, The Princess Margaret Hospital saw its first NPD Week celebrations in September 2015. The week of activities included an opening ceremony, NPD display within the hospital, a church service, a seminar for NPD staff, and a nurturing day for nurses with outstanding participation in continuing nursing education. We even submitted our decorated board to the ANPD decorated space contest; we did not win, but we participated.

By July 2016, I was on my way to my first ANPD convention. The theme for the convention was “Aspire to Inspire.” There were so many workshops that I wanted to attend but they ran concurrently. After much deliberation, I registered for the NPD Certification Prep Course. Was I ready to sit for the certification exam? Of course not! My goal was to attend the 2-day course to gain more insight into the role of the NPD practitioner, particularly the leadership role.

The Certification Prep Course, which was facilitated by the energetic, humorous, and engaging Mr. Gregory Durkin, was much more than certification prep. Participants shared work-related experiences and best practices, and Greg shared success tips and resources for successful management of NPD. By the end of day one, a Facebook page had been created for participants to stay connected and support each other in the quest to become certified. By the closing of day two I felt ready to begin studying for the NPD certification exam; instead I returned home and completed an application to test. 

The entire convention exceeded my expectations. Speakers were inspiring; the session on the revised scope and standards of the NPD practitioner was very informative; the poster display was clearly the largest I had seen and covered a variety of themes from orientation and onboarding, to mentorship, to use of technology, to bridging generational gaps, to interprofessional education. I attended every networking session, purchased resources, and interacted with as many vendors as time allowed. One of the main highlights for me was mingling with the authors of the book Leadership in Nursing Professional Development: An Organizational and System Focus. I felt proud to be a member of ANPD.

Post-convention, I returned home inspired and with a new zest to inspire other continuing education staff members in my organization. We again celebrated NPD Week and agreed to make it an annual event. I shared my convention experience with staff members of my team and added my collection of new ANPD publications to our library of resources. I knew more than ever that I was a specialist, that not anyone could do what I did. I felt a need to validate my role and bring awareness to the value of nursing professional development to the organization.

On October 24th 2016, I passed the NPD Certification exam. I shared the good news with my fellow workshop participants. Oh, I had to tell my colleagues, Greg, and Mary, and anyone else who cared to listen. To my knowledge, I was the first person in The Bahamas to achieve NPD Certification. What an accomplishment! Of course, when I shared the news at home the popular response was: “Congratulations, what does that mean and what is NPD?” I had to educate my colleagues about my specialty. I realized that I had to prepare an elevator speech on the role of the NPD practitioner.

Today, I am proud to be a certified Nursing Professional Development Practitioner. I value my specialty because my Master’s Degree in nursing education focused more on the roles and responsibilities of the educator in an academic setting. The NPD specialty has a unique scope of practice different from that of the academic educator and requires unique competencies. Through achieving certification, a nursing professional demonstrates that he/she has achieved advanced knowledge and skills in a chosen specialty and is dedicated to improving patient outcomes. I am committed to advocating for the NPD specialty in The Bahamas, and as far as my influence reaches. I aspire to enhance my ability to articulate the value of NPD as a specialty and, as a nurse leader, use my expertise to enhance nursing practice and, ultimately, better patient outcomes.

I am grateful for the vision of the pioneers of ANPD. The current leaders inspire me; they are talented, committed, reachable and approachable. Dr. Mary Harper, Director of Nursing Professional Development, is but an instant message away. The resources and networking opportunities available through the ANPD website are limitless. The publications are specific to the needs of NPD professionals. It is my hope to one day serve on one of the ANPD committees. Who knows, one day a Certification Prep Course or even the ANPD Annual Convention could be held in the beautiful Bahamas.