Native American graduate nursing students' learning experiences

Purpose: To identify learning experiences of Native American graduate nursi ng students in a university-based nurse practitioner program. Design: The phenomenological approach of Heideggerian hermeneutics. Method: A purposive sample of 11 Native American graduate students in a nur se practitioner program were given the choice of participating in a focus g roup or completing an individual interview to elicit common meanings and sh ared experiences. Findings: Four themes and two constitutive patterns: (a) Native American st udents' worldviews reflected unwritten Knowledge that served as a backgroun d of common understanding, (b) academic environment as a rigid environment with only one way to learn and constant evaluation, (c) faculty-student rel ationship barriers to establishing a supportive learning environment, and ( d) strategies to survive, including a commitment to succeed, conforming to unwritten rules, helping each other, and ultimately changing themselves. Co nstitutive patterns were: (d) value conflicts when students' values conflic ted with academic behavioral values, and (b) on the fringe, when students f elt isolation from the main student body, and open to attack (evaluation). Students struggled to be successful in their commitment to complete the deg ree, but often questioned the applicability of the program in their cultura l setting. Conclusions: A more flexible supportive environment is needed to support st udents' goals to attain degrees, as well as to encourage dialogue on differ ing cultural values. Faculty who teach culturally diverse students may need to examine rigid behavioral standards that mandate an assertive practition er persona and may be a barrier to attainment of goals.