Assessing global partnerships in graduate nursing

SummaryNorth–South partnerships in graduate nursing education can prepare students to address global healthcare issues, increase cultural competence, and build research capacity. However, the current literature does not include a critical and systematic assessment of partnerships using established guidelines. This paper has two objectives: 1) Find and refine a suitable measure to assess a North–South inter-institutional research and clinical partnership in nursing; 2) Pilot test an assessment measure and describe the results of a systematic institutional self-evaluation of a developing North–South research and clinical partnership within a graduate nursing program.The first objective was addressed by searching for, examining and selecting an assessment measure. The second objective was obtained by applying the assessment measure to a developing graduate-level research and clinical partnership between a Canadian School of Nursing and a Malawian College of Nursing; qualitative data collected included information from a document review and subjective experiences of partners.Results showed that when appropriate revisions are made to an existing guideline, it is applicable to use as an assessment measure for North–South inter-institutional research and clinical partnerships. Recommendations for improvement were made, allowing the guideline to be more specific for research and clinical partnerships. Results demonstrated that the existing Canadian–Malawian partnership was strongest in the guideline category of “shaping the purpose and scope of the partnership,” and weakest in “partnership implementation and context.”This paper implies that: 1) evaluation can strengthen partnerships and enhance educational experience for nursing students; 2) research comparing and contrasting different genres of partnerships could help determine which type is the most appropriate for an institutions' particular outcome goals; and 3) effective establishment and maintenance of North–South partnership occurs through an on-going process of evaluation.