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This series of six articles is inspired by themes arising from the Royal College of Midwives' state of midwifery education report. The series explores the current landscape and challenges in educating the future midwifery workforce, particularly those that relate to the higher education workforce. This penultimate article examines the interplay between the practice and academic environments and the impact this has on both students and staff alike, particularly in the wake of changing standards for student supervision. The article explores whether the nature of being an educator in a health field such as midwifery is unique because of the need to support students through placement challenges when there are limitations on what higher education institutions can realistically influence. It also examines the 'extra' responsibilities put on midwifery education staff to support students by way of 'academic assessor' roles. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This series of six articles is inspired by themes arising from the Royal College of Midwives' state of midwifery education report. The series explores the current landscape and challenges in educating the future midwifery workforce, particularly those that relate to the higher education workforce. This fourth article looks at what it is like to work in midwifery education compared to in practice as a midwife. The challenges associated with transition, remuneration, workload, casual working and the breadth of the midwifery education role are examined, particularly in comparison to other disciplines in higher education. The article explores how educators can be better supported in their training of the future midwifery workforce, while assuring their own progression and equal treatment in an increasingly competitive and tightly regulated sector. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This series of six articles is inspired by themes arising from the Royal College of Midwives State of Midwifery Education report. The series explores the current landscape and challenges in educating the future midwifery workforce, particularly those that pertain to the higher education workforce. This third article highlights the lack of global majority midwifery academics, and charts the decisions and experiences of global majority applicants and students in midwifery higher education. The barriers these students face include systemic and individual racism. These experiences likely impact global majority midwives choosing academic careers, yet greater diversity and representation is needed in the education workforce. This article explores how this might be achieved by examining sources of systemic racism and how to decolonise midwifery curricula in order to tackle inequality not just for educators and professionals, but for women in midwifery care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This series of six articles is inspired by themes arising from the Royal College of Midwives State of Midwifery Education report. The series explores the current landscape and challenges in educating the future midwifery workforce, particularly those that pertain to the higher education workforce. This second article highlights some of the inequalities experienced by the majority female midwifery education workforce and their impact, exploring how these inequalities are symptomatic of many of the inequalities women experience more generally within patriarchal structures. The article examines if midwifery education is 'women's work', and how this can work to impede progression in leadership, research and scholarship for midwifery academics. How midwifery curricula can influence the future academic workforce in dismantling inequality is also considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is the first article in a series of six inspired by themes arising from the Royal College of Midwives' State of Midwifery Education report. These articles will explore the current landscape and challenges in educating the future midwifery workforce, particularly those that pertain to the higher education workforce. This first article introduces the concept of a profession using sociological theories. It considers who we are individually, as authors, academics and midwives, and collectively considers our identity as a profession alongside those whom we teach. The aim is to ensure that staff and students are supported to succeed and thrive. Education can transform lives, so that current and future midwives can make a difference in providing safe, compassionate care for service users. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Grading of practice has been incorporated into the Nursing and Midwifery Council's midwifery education standards since 2009. The literature identifies that grading practice can be fraught with challenges not least related to subjectivity, inconsistency, lack of transparency and grade inflation. An established group of UK-wide lead midwife educators recognised these challenges and through completing a three-phase project, developed an evidence-based practice assessment toolkit which aims to facilitate consistent, robust and objective grading of student practice. It is suggested that this toolkit may be useful to those developing practice assessment documentation or writing evidence to reflect a student's progress and achievement in practice [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim To reduce variations in grading of midwifery practice and enhance reliability of assessment. Background The first phase of a national project showed there to be widely ranging interpretation and application of professional educational standards in relation to grading of practice in midwifery. This raised concerns about reliability and equity of professional assessment. The second phase therefore sought to achieve consensus on a set of core principles. Methods A participatory action research process in two stages, using a Mini-Delphi approach. Educational leads from all 55 institutions delivering midwifery programmes nationally were invited to participate. Stage one : Questionnaire comprising 12 statements drawn from the findings of the initial phase of the project. Stage two: Face-to-face discussion. Findings Statements were categorised based on questionnaire responses: 1) Consensus, 2) Staged consensus, 2) Minor modifications, 4) Controversial. Consensus was achieved on 11 core principles through group discussion; only one was omitted from the final set. Recommendations All midwifery programmes nationally to incorporate the agreed core principles. Findings should be disseminated to the regulatory body to help inform changes to midwifery and nursing educational standards. The core principles may also contribute to curriculum development in midwifery and other professions internationally. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many universities use a tripartite assessment within the pre-registration midwifery curriculum to grade student practice; we consider what the purpose and value are from an educational, formal and social perspective. By utilising research, policy documents and reflections from our experiences we explore the principles which underpin this judgement of student performance. After deliberation, we consider the increased presence in practice to have many benefits, but have evidence that it is not required educationally, to assess student practice, or to formalise the assessment process, since sign-off mentors are now better prepared to undertake this role. Thus, to support our increased partnership with practice, afforded by tripartite assessments, we offer an alternative. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]