Epistemological leadership in nursing education

IF 4.5 3区医学 Q1 NURSING

Nurse Education in Practice Pub Date : 2026-08-01 Epub Date: 2026-07-27 DOI:10.1016/j.nepr.2026.104934

Karen-Ann Clarke

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引用次数: 0

Abstract

Aim

To propose epistemological leadership as a framework for understanding how curriculum decisions shape knowledge architecture and professional formation in nursing education.

Background

Curriculum design in nursing education is often treated as a technical task of selecting content, organising courses and meeting accreditation requirements. This framing can obscure the epistemological work of curriculum design in determining what knowledge is treated as central, durable and professionally legitimate.

Design

Discussion paper.

Methods

A conceptual analysis was undertaken, drawing on curriculum, leadership and nursing education scholarship. The argument is illustrated through the redesign of an undergraduate nursing program in an Australian university context.

Results

Epistemological leadership is enacted through three interdependent modes: cognitive enactment, which makes knowledge commitments explicit and translates them into curriculum architecture; relational enactment, which builds shared understanding and coordination across distributed teams; and political enactment, which secures legitimacy and durability within regulatory and institutional systems. The illustrative case shows how mental health, trauma-informed care, clinical reasoning and integrated bioscience can be positioned as longitudinal architectural commitments rather than isolated content areas.

Conclusions

Epistemological leadership helps explain how curricula move beyond fragmented content coverage toward coherent professional formation while remaining accountable to standards, competency expectations and patient safety. Although illustrated through an Australian program redesign, the framework is intended to support analysis of curriculum architecture across diverse international nursing education contexts.

查看原文本刊更多论文

护理教育的认识论领导。

目的：提出认识论领导作为理解课程决策如何塑造护理教育知识架构和专业形成的框架。背景：护理教育课程设计通常被视为选择内容、组织课程和满足认证要求的技术任务。这种框架可以模糊课程设计的认识论工作，以确定哪些知识被视为核心，持久和专业合法。设计：讨论文件。方法：利用课程、领导能力和护理教育学术进行概念分析。通过在澳大利亚大学背景下重新设计本科护理课程来说明这一论点。结果：认识论领导是通过三种相互依存的模式来实施的：认知制定，将知识承诺明确并转化为课程架构；关系制定，它在分布式团队之间建立共享的理解和协调；政治立法，在监管和制度体系内确保合法性和持久性。该案例说明了心理健康、创伤护理、临床推理和综合生物科学如何被定位为纵向的建筑承诺，而不是孤立的内容领域。结论：认识论领导有助于解释课程如何超越碎片化的内容覆盖，走向连贯的专业形成，同时保持对标准、能力期望和患者安全负责。虽然通过澳大利亚程序重新设计说明，该框架旨在支持跨不同国际护理教育背景的课程结构分析。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Nurse Education in Practice NURSING-

CiteScore

5.40

自引率

9.40%

发文量

180

审稿时长

51 days

期刊介绍： Nurse Education in Practice enables lecturers and practitioners to both share and disseminate evidence that demonstrates the actual practice of education as it is experienced in the realities of their respective work environments. It is supportive of new authors and will be at the forefront in publishing individual and collaborative papers that demonstrate the link between education and practice.