How to support development of professional identity of student nurses before and after an internship abroad; Innovation initiative

Student nurses can take an internship abroad. The purpose of this internship is to teach student nurses to act professionally and thus develop both personal and professional competencies relevant for intercultural aspects of their professional identity. Generally, there is a lack of attention to learning processes and development of re-entry programmes. This paper discusses arguments for a re-entry programme consisting of four workshops: one before the internship abroad and three after returning home. A Danish nursing education programme has chosen an innovative concept of transformative learning through blended learning and use of the Danish study activity model to support student nurses´ experiences from an internship abroad. This paper is based on travel letters written by the ten participating student nurses. The pilot project indicates that the re-entry programme might be beneficial for student nurses´ learning and awareness of the ongoing process of working with own professional identity. The re-entry programme will be continued and systematic evaluation will be initiated to document the learning outcome related to development of professional identity.