Nurses speak out on mandatory continuing education in the United States Virgin Islands.

摘要

This study sought to determine the attitudes and practices of nurses with respect to continuing education in general and mandatory continuing education in particular among nurses in the Virgin Islands. The study also sought to determine the factors that explain the attitudes and practices observed. Attitudes to continuing education were measured using the Rutgers Adult Attitude to Continuing Education scale and attitude to mandatory continuing education was measured on the Rockhill Objection to Adult Learning scale. The one-way, completely randomized ANOVA was used as the main method of inference. Primary data were collected using a simple random sample and mailed questionnaire.;It was found that the behavior of the nurses with respect to participation in continuing education is not dependent on the attitude to continuing education in general. Also, most nurses tend to participate in continuing education. Despite this, nurses in the Virgin Islands are generally undecided or lean towards opposition to continuing education in general and mandatory continuing education in particular. Among the important factors explaining attitudes to continuing education are age, education, the level of participation in professional organizations, income, and race. The older, the more educated, the more active in professional agencies, and the higher the income, the more the nurse tends to be opposed to mandatory continuing education and the more the nurse is likely to encourage others to engage in voluntary continuing education; moreover, the more such nurses are likely to be actively involved in continuing education.