Master of Science Program

The Master of Science program at UMass Amherst Elaine Marieb College of Nursing is a distance-accessible program offered through predominantly asynchronous delivery methods. All coursework is offered through University Without Walls (UWW))/Online Education: www.umass.edu/uww/.

I. Nursing Studies Concentration (MSNS): 30 credits

Objectives of the Master of Nursing Science Degree

1. Apply advanced knowledge and core competencies to the development and evaluation nursing care for diverse individuals or populations.
2. Integrate and understand how nursing theory impacts nursing practice and the delivery of healthcare.
3. Interpret and critically analyze research and its application to nursing practice and evidence-based practice.

Course Requirements

The Nursing Studies Concentration in the master’s program consists of 30 credits, including the seven core courses in our Master of Science curriculum listed below:

MSNS Course Descriptions

N603: Theoretical Components of Nursing Practice - 3 credits
Students will examine and evaluate the components and functions of theory by exploring the role of different types of theory in a practice discipline.

N604: Introduction to Statistics for Health Research-3 credits
This course focuses on introductory statistical techniques frequently used in health sciences research, use of analytic software and database creation and management.

N615: Advanced Pathophysiology-3 credits
Concepts and theories related to disorders of physiological processes which result in health alterations in the child and the adult. Alterations in normal body functions leading to disease and discomfort of the individual presented within an organizing framework. Clinical inferences from concepts and theories of pathophysiology and pharmacology presented in relation to clinical nursing practice in primary care.

N614: Advanced Health Assessment-3 credits
Classroom and laboratory practice and case-based approaches to health assessment and differential diagnosis of common health problems for diverse groups provide the context for advanced health assessment and clinical reasoning.

N619: Advanced Pharmacology-3 credits
This course reviews in depth the principles of pharmacology for classes of drugs commonly used in various health care practices.  The most pertinent drug classes for nursing practice are included in this course.

N630: Research Methodology in Nursing- 3 credits
Relationship between research and theory development and clinical practice in nursing. Includes research design, methods of data collection, and a variety of analytical procedures for interpreting results.

Electives

In addition to the core courses, the following electives courses are needed:

12 additional credits, at least three of which must be from the Elaine Marieb College of Nursing. The remaining nine credits must meet the conditions for graduate credit as outlined in the Graduate Bulletin.

Eligibility

Students enrolled in the PhD or DNP programs will be eligible to apply for this concentration. The goal of the MSNS concentration is to recognize students who have completed the necessary credits for a master’s degree in nursing and to provide competent MS-prepared nurses for generalist roles in nursing. This flexible program of study is intended for candidates in our doctoral or master’s programs who have fulfilled the requirements of the MSNS but are unable to complete their full plan of study or for those PhD or DNP students who were admitted as post-bachelor’s students and wish to complete the MSNS en route to completing the doctorate.

II. Nursing Education Concentration (MSNE): 32 credits

The Master of Science in Nursing Education prepares students to educate nursing students and health care professionals in the classroom, clinical, and online learning environment for the overall enhancement of nursing practice and health care delivery. The program fulfills the knowledge and competencies specified by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) for master’s education and for the specific master’s in nursing education role and readies graduates to take the National League for Nursing certification examinations.

At the completion of this program, the graduate will be prepared to:

1. Develop a grounding in pedagogical theories
2. Evaluate nursing curriculum using accreditation guidelines
3. Consider quality measures in nursing education in developing and evaluating nursing curriculum
4. Use creative teaching methods to enhance pedagogy
5. Reflect on their own teaching style as a means of incorporating new teaching strategies
6. Train nurses for education roles in colleges, universities, and clinical settings
7. Develop an area of advanced clinical expertise for further development of the nurse educator role

Course Requirements

The Nursing Education concentration in the master’s program consists of 32 credits, including the six core courses in our Master of Science curriculum listed below and N621, a direct care clinical practicum in which the student will develop an area of advanced expertise in nursing practice.

MSNE Required Courses, and Course Sequence

MSNE Course Descriptions

N560 Simulation for Healthcare Education- 3 credits
Critique theories associated with simulation, communication, and evaluation of student outcomes. Reviews care of simulation equipment and software and how to create and facilitate simulations culminating with a developed simulation.

N621 Clinical Practicum for Advanced Direct Care and Clinical Reasoning for Nurse Educators- 2 credit
This supervised clinical practicum affords graduate students the opportunity to practice direct nursing care of diverse clients with varied needs in an identified area of nursing
practice at an advanced level while collaborating with an interprofessional team.

N641 Curriculum Development and Evaluation Process in Nursing- 3 credits
This course focuses on developing the knowledge and skills of nurse educators in applying principles of curriculum development, evaluation, and related processes in nursing education.

N642 Teaching in Nursing- 3 credits
Focuses on the dynamic, creative process of teaching and learning clinical nursing in preparation for competent, reflective nursing practice. Philosophies, theories, methodologies, and trends relevant to nursing education included.

N698T Teaching Practicum in Nursing (Pre-requisites: N642 and N641)
This course provides the framework, mentorship, and coaching for graduate students to develop skills in teaching in the classroom, in clinical settings, and in an online environment.

Clinical and Teaching Practicum Information

Students have two practicums as part of their plan of study in the MSNE program. The first, N621 Clinical Practicum for Advanced Direct Care and Clinical Reasoning for Nurse Educators, is a direct care practicum in which students will develop an area of nursing expertise in a direct patient care setting. This is a two-credit clinical practicum course, which translates to 112 contact hours (at a one-credit-hour to four-clinical-hour ratio). These direct care clinical contact hours are allocated for supervised practice in selected clinical facilities or community agencies. Placement will be arranged through negotiation with clinical preceptors, agencies, and the Elaine Marieb College of Nursing.

Direct Care Learning Environment: Patient or Patient Population Setting

Examples:

• Health care facility/primary care setting
• Community/public health setting or outreach site
• Psychiatric-mental health setting
• OB/GYN or other specialty site
• Acute or chronic medical-surgical or long-term care/rehabilitation setting

The student will be assigned to a qualified preceptor who will guide the student in meeting course objectives. The course faculty will collaborate with the preceptor throughout the clinical practicum and will be responsible for evaluating the student’s performance and progress. Students will record their clinical hours in Typhon.

Practicum Focus

The AACN/CCNE master’s in nursing education Essentials emphasize practicum experience at the master’s degree level in the direct care role as a critical component in nursing educator training to advance the knowledge and expertise of students in a clinical area of practice. “Direct care” is defined as “nursing care provided to individuals or families that is intended to achieve specific health goals or achieve selected health outcomes.”

In N621, students will master clinical reasoning and nursing at the advanced graduate level. Depending on the plan of study, the practicum will run concurrently or sequentially with N614 Advanced Health Assessment, aligning with the didactic and theoretical material covered in the latter course. Students will hone baccalaureate level skills in health and physical assessment while advancing to higher level clinical reasoning skills and applying those skills within an identified clinical area of practice to build graduate level expertise in that area. Focus will be on analysis of patients/clients within the practice setting and application of evidence for best practice outcomes in developing and actualizing a treatment plan and patient education in collaboration with a preceptor and healthcare team.

Student Requirements for Nursing Education Practicum Sites and Preceptor Selection:

This practicum N621 will provide the opportunity for students to develop graduate level expertise in a specific area of nursing practice. All students must complete all pre-practicum requirements, including uploading documentation to the online credentialing platform (Castle Branch) before beginning clinical contact hours. See current graduate student handbook for specifics of requirements for entry to a clinical practicum site.

Students will engage in a search for their preceptors with the help of faculty. Acceptable qualified preceptors include master’s prepared nurses working directly with patients, Clinical Nurse Leaders (CNL), Clinical Nurse Specialists (CNS), Nurse Practitioners, Nurse Midwives (CNMs), or MDs. Students may follow preceptors in hospitals, clinics, private practice settings and/or community settings. Students may choose settings such as acute or chronic care, long term care or rehabilitation, palliative care, psychiatric-mental health, public health primary care that match our faculty members’ areas of expertise and practice.

A student may choose to have two preceptors, if having two preceptors’ aids in achieving course requirements. Preceptors must have at least one year or greater experience in their field of expertise. Pre-approval by the practicum faculty or MS Director of all preceptors is required. Site visits for some local/regional students and online virtual or phone conference calls for all local/regional students and online virtual or phone conference calls for all local, regional, and distance preceptors will be completed during the practicum. The clinical practicum faculty of record for the course has responsibility for overall evaluation of all students and will rely, in part, on preceptors’ evaluations of students and students’ self-evaluations.

Students will arrange to complete hours as per preceptor/student schedules but should plan for about 8 hours per week so that contact hours can be completed by the end of the course. Each student will download the course syllabi (Both N614 and N621), the preceptor/faculty/student agreement, the preceptor handbook including preceptor orientation materials and all evaluation forms available in the Graduate Preceptor Handbook and Graduate Student Handbook and deliver to the preceptor on/before the initial contract meeting. The College of Nursing needs a signed preceptor/faculty/student agreement, preceptor’s resume/CV and contact information sent to the College of Nursing before contact hours can begin to be included in your student file and our preceptor directory.

Students will enroll in Typhon at the beginning of the program and document their clinical hours for N621 in the Typhon Software. They will continue to document their teaching hours in Typhon when they take their teaching practicum course, N698T and will develop a teaching portfolio.

Master’s Degree Program Office                                                                                          

University of Massachusetts Amherst
Elaine Marieb College of Nursing
032 Skinner Hall
Amherst, MA 01003-9304
lyovina [at] umass [dot] edu (Lynn Yovina,) Program Specialist

III. Clinical Nurse Leader (CNL) Concentration: 32 credits 

The Clinical Nurse Leader (CNL) concentration strengthens health care delivery by teaching the advanced knowledge and skills needed to provide comprehensive, across-the-life-span nursing services to individuals, families and groups. Teaching, inquiry and outreach prepare professional nurses to think critically and reflectively, prepare to serve a culturally diverse population, and manage care autonomously while holistically assessing and treating both health care needs and human responses to illness. The concentration also promotes social accountability; students are educated and encouraged to work for reform in the healthcare system at the community, regional and national levels. The Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE), a national nursing education accrediting body, accredits this concentration.

The CNL is accountable for the application of research-based information and the efficient and cost-effective use of resources to improve clinical and environmental care outcomes and effect change in health care organizations.

The graduate is prepared to lead both intradisciplinary and interdisciplinary health care teams, and to function across all clinical settings in order to meet the demands of a complex care delivery system.

This program addresses the knowledge and competencies specified by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) for Master’s Education and for the specific Clinical Nurse Leader role focus. The graduate is prepared to take the CNL certification examination prepared by the Commission on Nurse Certification (CNC) through AACN.

Objectives of the Master of Science Clinical Nurse Leader Program

This program will prepare students to:

• Implement the CNL role in a variety of clinical settings
• Apply advanced knowledge (pharmacology, pathophysiology, health assessment) and core competencies (critical thinking, communication, nursing technology/resources) to the development and evaluation of a plan of care for individuals or populations at the point of care
• Assume accountability for the efficient and cost-effective use of human, environmental and national resources by applying principles of healthcare policy, finance, economics and ethics to improve quality of care delivery
• Integrate knowledge of informatics, human diversity and ethics to address and manage variation in population outcomes and ensure culturally relevant care
• Implement evidence-based practices and professional standards of care to affect change in health care organizations and improve outcomes of care
• Apply principles of leadership and collaboration to improve the health outcomes of individuals and clinical populations
• Improve clinical practice and optimize healthcare outcomes through use of information systems and technologies
• Advocate for the client, interdisciplinary care team and profession in legislative and regulatory arenas

Course Requirements

The Master’s CNL concentration requires completion of 32 credit hours of coursework and selected courses include practicum/project hours. The curriculum consists of: 24 didactic credit hours and 8 practicum credit hours.

CNL Courses

*N698N & N798N Clinical contact hours are devoted to the design, implementation, and evaluation of the CNL Capstone Project.

Sequence of Coursework through the Master’s CNL Concentration

Students enrolled in the Master’s CNL concentration must progress through coursework as specified in their individualized Plans of Study. Students need to take informatics, theory, research, and epidemiology before or concurrent with the launch of care core courses. In terms of the sequence of the care core courses: students must take N615 Advanced Pathophysiology and N619 Advanced Pharmacology before they progress to N614 Advanced Health Assessment. Students are expected to apply learned content from the previous two courses throughout the didactic course N614. 

All courses in the MS CNL concentration must be successfully completed before the student is allowed to enter their final clinical year of the program. The final clinical courses, N698N (2 cr.-112 contact hours) and N798N (6 cr. – 336 contact hours) for a total of 448 hours for students to be able to design and then implement a microsystem level Capstone Project.

CNL Capstone project

Students will identify a practice-focused quality improvement project (all N698N) and will actualize and evaluate the project (spring N798N) either on their units or within a setting of their choice once negotiated. These will be negotiated and designed by the faculty of record for the courses and the students individually.

Both fall (N698N) and spring (N798N) clinical experiences are completed in the same setting. The setting requirement is that there be a patient population cared for by nurses. The setting will depend on the subject of the Capstone proposal. CNL students need a preceptor from the setting to oversee the project, and the student may work with one preceptor or a team.

Note: The primary requirement for the main preceptor is a master’s degree in nursing. If there is a certified CNL in the setting, that person would be an ideal preceptor. Many students work with master’s prepared nursing educators, or even a nurse manager who has a MS in nursing. Students will log practicum hours completed for the two final clinical courses in a diary or journal format. If you have any questions about suitable preceptors, you may contact the CNL Program Director.

In the N698N and N798N CNL Practicum courses, the capstone project is designed (in N698N) and then actualized at the micro-system level in N798N.

Goals and objectives for N698N and N798N:

1. Identify and collect appropriate evidence and data supporting a previously identified clinical issue important to your setting.
2. Conduct a trend analysis of the data, appropriate for this issue.
3. Analyze sentinel events related to the identified clinical issue.

Key areas for success 

1. Find a topic for which you have a passion!
2. Find a knowledgeable person who wants to share that passion and guide you.
3. Engage your support people in your efforts.
4. Be flexible, plan well ahead, and be persistent!

Clinical Requirements

CNL students are to follow the guidelines for College of Nursing students as outlined in this book. All students must complete the requirements of CastleBranch as a pre-requisite to beginning a clinical practicum.

Faculty Advisors

All College of Nursing faculty members who have graduate faculty status are potential advisors for master’s students. Students will be assigned an advisor upon admission. Graduate students are expected to meet at least once per semester with their advisor to outline their plan of study and discuss academic progress.

Clinical Nurse Leader Program Office

University of Massachusetts Amherst
Elaine Marieb College of Nursing
032 Skinner Hall
Amherst, MA 01003-9304
Lynn Yovina, Program Specialist

IV  Public Health Concentration (36 credits)

Objective of the Master of Science Public Health degree (MS-PH)

This master’s degree will enable students to apply clinical nursing expertise and population health skills in state and local Public Health and Community Health agencies, Visiting Nurse and Homecare Associations, Federal Agencies and teach population health nursing. Population based practice in nursing focuses on improving the health of the whole community whether locally, nationally, or globally, including individuals, families, and communities, with particular emphasis on underserved and marginalized populations.  It involves a process of assessment, policy planning and development of holistic plans of care as well as critical thinking and interprofessional collaboration at the systems level.

Course Requirements

The Public Health concentration in the master’s program consists of 36 credits including two practicum experiences (N698G & N798LL).

The final two semesters will involve specialty courses and clinical practicums in public and population health practice.  These courses emphasize community engagement and collaboration including community needs assessments, practice in grant writing and the application and evaluation of evidence based nursing practice at the public health and population level.

Course Descriptions

N540 Epidemiology for Clinicians (3cr)
This course provides in-depth theoretical knowledge on concepts and principles of epidemiology and its application in health promotion and disease prevention. Its focus will be on key areas of epidemiology.

N640 Advanced Public Health Nursing I is a course that is designed to provide advanced practice nurses specializing in the role of the Public Health Nurse Leader with the knowledge and skills required to identify and analyze population-based public health problems as they occur in the local, national, and global community. Analysis and evaluation of health problems at the community and population level will occur with evidenced based strategies designed to strengthen health promotion and disease prevention, research, practice, education, and policy.

N750 Advanced Public Health Nursing II course is an examination of the theories, models and process of public health program planning, with a focus on designing, implementing, monitoring, and evaluating population-based public health programs, including financial program management and effective grant writing strategies.

Master of Science – Public Health Office

University of Massachusetts Amherst
Elaine Marieb College of Nursing
032 Skinner Hall
Amherst, MA 01003-9304
lyovina [at] umass [dot] edu (Lynn Yovina), Program Specialist

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