Developing Nursing Students’ Soft Skills: Learned from the Collaborative Network for Educational Quality Assurance

Abstract

The long-term Thai Higher Education plan (B.E.2560-2574) for student development is focused on soft skills. Soft skills are a part of People Management Competency which involves many skills such as social, communication, problem solving, as well as attitudes and personal attributes. The value for professional nursing from soft skills development includes emotional quotient or virtues. Those virtues need a period of time to develop as well as to assess.

Nursing educators propose two expected characteristic of graduates’ soft skills; good human relationships, leadership and professional faithfulness, and trust in nursing and the self-value of promoting good to people. Learning is based on humanizing theory, belief in learning through experiences of realization, skills and attitudes concurrently. The focus of learning is the students’ sensations, values, ideas, and fascination.

This article reflects principles learned from out-of-class experiences of 80 nursing students from four private institutes serving the teenage health promotion Collaborative Network for Educational Quality Assurance project. Their reflection for self-development suggests the need to apply knowledge to the real situation for problem solving, have improved communication, relationships, and team work, realize community problems and be proud of reducing social problems through trust in nursing values. The challenge in developing students’ soft skills is to recognize the national need for future professional competency. This should originate from two viewpoints, those of executive policy and of faculty in designing the platforms of out- of-class learning.