Baccalaureate Nurses: Territoriality And Professionalism

Abstract

Changes in health status, health care delivery and the nature of nursing practice, have resulted in a process of change within the nursing profession. Implicit in this process is the official position of the Canadian Nurses Association (CNA) board of directors that, by the year 2000, the minimum educational requirement for entry into practice should be successful completion of a baccalaureate degree in nursing (CNA, 1982). One outcome for the profession has been the demand by registered nurses for access to post-basic baccalaureate education. To meet this, a subsequent increase in the available spaces in existing post-basic baccalaureate programs and in distance education programs being offered in certain geographical areas has resulted. Baccalaureate-prepared nurses as a group have, prior to this point, enjoyed a prominence within nursing, partly through the educational status related to the attainment of a degree, and partly related to the limited size of the group. With the increasing numbers of baccalaureate-prepared nurses, there will be inevitable changes to the intra-professional status ascribed to those members presently holding a baccalaureate degree. How will the changes in intra-professional status influence attitudes toward the CNA educational goal for the nursing profession? Are the attitudes of baccalaureate nurses towards baccalaureate education congruent with the goals of their professional associations? Do professional norms and values internalized by this group through socialization to the profession transcend what Ardrey (1966) describes as territoriality?