University of Massachusetts, Amherst

College of Nursing
NUR 398F, Nursing Care of Children: Practicum
Well Child School Experience

Purpose: The purpose of this experience is to provide the nursing student with an opportunity
to provide care to well children in a school setting. The focus is on primary prevention. There
will be learning opportunities to provide care to individual children and to larger groups
meeting biophysical, cultural and psychosocial healthcare needs.

Objectives:
- Assist school nurse with health screenings and care of students who utilize health
services
- Familiarize self with school environment or multiservice agency documentation system
(student may document as appropriate)
- Students may assist in dispensing of oral medication under the direct supervision of the
school nurse. Students may not give medications independently.
- Identify psychosocial & biophysical concerns appropriate to developmental age of
students and plan of care in the school setting
- Identify barriers to wellness within the student’s school and home environments
- Identify special considerations of treatment of minors in Massachusetts
- Identify cultural influences and the impact of care on students in the school setting
- Evaluate policy & protocols in place guiding school health care
- Identify school safety and rescue response protocol and measures in place to support
response
- Evaluate health teaching needs of the student population
- Complete journal reflections following each clinical day
- Document achievements and learning in the clinical evaluation tool (CET)
- Develop and implement a teaching program on a topic that was approved by school
staff member (optional)
Post-Conference Topics
Week 1- Discuss health concerns of children from a variety of ages/developmental stage, role &
responsibilities of the School Registered Nurse. Family is selected for Family Assessment-
discuss the plan & review the assessment for Visit 1.
Week 2- Discuss school safety and rescue response policies and resources available at your
school. Report on Visit 1 with your family, review the Family Assessment prepared by the
student & discuss issues/diagnoses & learning needs. Plan Teaching Project (Interventions) for
Visit 2.
Week 3- Discuss the various cultures of children at your school & how this impacts their health
and your delivery of care & discuss how the Fadiman book changed your perceptions. Discuss
ethical & legal issues you are seeing in school. Report on Visit 2 & evaluation of teaching of
your selected family & hand in the project to faculty.
Week 4- Discuss the variety of healthcare issues you and your school nurse addressed &
changes needed to improve care (Healthy People 2020 Leading Health Indicators). Review CET
with faculty to insure completeness.

Journal Topics- Include 1 reference source for best practice using APA format & identify level of
evidence and quality based on Johns Hopkins Appraisal Tool.
Week 1 – Discuss the developmental age of the students in the school, resources and barriers
to providing care to students, general policies for the provision of care, & students’
health/teaching needs and day-to-day responsibilities of the School Registered Nurse.
Week 2- Identify general safety and rescue response plans including formal policies for this
school setting, discuss the resources available to implement the rescue plans, & provide faculty
with examples from your school.
Week 3- Identify the variety of cultures of students within the school setting, discuss changes in
the plan of care necessary to support their health care needs, & discuss legal and ethical
considerations regarding treatment of minors. (Journal for this week is a Threaded Discussion
on Blackboard Learn & please read Preface and Chapters 1-5 in Fadiman’s “The Spirit Catches
You and You Fall Down”.)
Week-4- Identify and discuss the variety of psychosocial and biophysical issues of students you
& the School Registered Nurse have provided care for these 4 weeks & select 2 Leading Health
Indicators from Healthy People 2020 to discuss how your school is meeting these objectives &
any changes you would implement in the health care delivery process to enhance care.
Length of total journal should be no more than 2 pages.
Please note: while it is traditional for students to provide some teaching programs during the
school day, it is not a requirement.
If the school allows the student to provide teaching in the school, the student may select a
topic appropriate to the developmental age and health needs of the school program (under the
direction of the School Registered Nurse & UMass Clinical Faculty) and may have opportunities
to share that information in the school setting.
School Registered Nurses may also identify other objectives of the clinical day and have the
student participate in health screenings, attend a field trip, or work on a special project. Please
inform faculty of any plans and faculty may be able to provide some guidance to direct the
learning opportunity for the student.
Post-conference: All students will participate in a post-conference following the school day. A
common location will be selected by the clinical faculty. Anticipate that the post-conference
will be at least one hour in length and very possibly 1.5 hours. Since all the students may have
different start times for the day, there may be lag time in between the school day and post-
conference for some students.