Professional Values in Action: Graduate Entry Nursing Students’ Experiences of Clinical Placements

Abstract

Graduate Entry Nursing (GEN) programmes have expanded nationally and internationally as accelerated pathways to address global nursing workforce shortages and diversify the professional workforce. While the existing literature documents GEN students’ motivations and academic outcomes, limited attention has been given to how professional values are developed, enacted, and sustained during clinical placements, particularly in accelerated, high-pressure educational contexts. This qualitative study explores how UK-based GEN students construct and negotiate professional values during their final clinical placements, using a social constructivist lens. Data were generated through focus groups and in-depth interviews and analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. Findings reveal that professional values are not static competencies but are dynamically shaped through mentorship, organisational culture, emotional labour, and ethical tension. Students demonstrated heightened emotional awareness and resilience, drawing on prior life experiences to navigate value conflict and sustain person-centred care. Although situated within the UK, the findings offer transferable insights for transnational nursing education by highlighting the importance of structured mentorship, emotionally informed pedagogy, and value-based learning within accelerated programmes. This study contributes to international debates on professional identity formation and values-in-practice within healthcare education.