Professional Experience Placement

This article recently published as part of a special issue on social media and education by MDPI Informatics by Mather, Douglas and O’Brien (2017) found that social media use by health profession students has increased over time.  It explores whether students are prepared or accepting of using social media for study purposes or not.  The study found that students were using and were prepared to use social media for sharing information, networking and collaborating with peers.  Other students however, did not want to blur the boundaries of personal and study life. Since the previous National social media study (Usher et al 2014) was undertaken this study found health profession students are now more interactive users of Facebook and Twitter, and they have become more familiar with career development sites, such as LinkedIn. The maturation of social media platforms within a three-year period has created realistic opportunities to integrate social media for personal and study purposes into the health profession education curriculum to ensure student understanding of the necessity for maintaining digital professionalism in the workplace. The implications for nurse or host supervisors is the necessity for being digitally literate and/or able to model digital professionalism to students.  Additionally, with the roll-out of new ANMAC accredited Bachelor of Nursing curricula across Australia creates opportunities for host supervisors to guide and support student nurses and other health profession students in safe and appropriate use of digital technology in the workplace.

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