This study aimed to analyze how nurses represent their role as nursing academics and their conceptions, strategies and feelings involved in teaching-learning and research in nursing. A qualitative study was conducted. To achieve this goal, a semi-structured interview was carried out with seven nurses who worked as teachers and researchers at a university in Barcelona, Spain. The data were analyzed through categories validated in a previous study with the support of The Atlas Ti program. The results evidenced that nurses are less equipped to develop the researcher role, and that the profession is not justified without a close relationship between nursing theory and practice. The nursing academics look for a balance between teaching and research and they also wish to promote the development of models and theories in their own discipline.

Objective. To represent how a new identity is being constructed by nurses initiating their activities as teachers. Methodology. In 2010, a descriptive-interpretative qualitative research was conducted of four cases of nurse teachers from Nursing Schools. Aspects of teacher identity and management of critical incidents in the classroom were reviewed. The information was obtained through a structured survey and the data underwent analysis of contents. Results. The nurses surveyed state that the teaching exercise is a culmination stage of clinical nursing. Teaching confers them stability in their professional life; however, they report that the complexity of the educational practice poses a big challenge. They feel responsible for the formation of future nursing professionals. In spite of defining themselves as constructivists in the way of teaching, they are governed by a technical conception on the way of approaching the educational practice. They attribute the critical incidents to which they are exposed to the types of students entering the universities; these turn out uncomfortable and do not feel responsible for their development. These incidents are lessons to better face similar situations in the future. Conclusion. The nurses participating in this study are facing their new role as teachers of human resource, seeking to construct a new identity different from what they had when working in direct care of individuals.

No abstract