A Murdoch University lecturer has been named as WA’s top nursing educator of the year.
Prue Andrus, who is a nursing lecturer and Simulation Lead, won the Excellence in Education category of the 2017 WA Nursing and Midwifery Excellence Awards.
12 out of Western Australia’s 38,000 nurses and midwives were honoured at the award ceremony.
Ms Andrus, who is an expert in clinical simulation, is responsible for creating and coordinating realistic healthcare training for Murdoch University’s nursing students.
These simulation learning environments ensure optimisation of the student’s clinical practice placement experiences over the three years of their program.
Ms Andrus said she was thrilled and overwhelmed to receive this award: “I feel very honoured to be recognised by my peers for my contributions to nurse education.
“By using simulation as a teaching method, I try to immerse students in the clinical healthcare environments that they will experience on placement and therefore help to prepare them to care for others.
“My greatest success is that I love my job and look forward to it each day, and I am supported by an awesome team of exceptional colleagues.”
Murdoch University’s Head of Nursing, Associate Professor Cathy Fetherston, said Prue Andrus was an outstanding role model for other nursing and midwifery educators, as well as for the future nurses and midwives.
“This award is a well deserved recognition of Prue's energy, positivity, creativity and considerable expertise in delivering her vision for the education of future nurses through immersion in Simulated Learning Environments,” she said.
“In addition to her teaching, Ms Andrus regularly meets with industry providers to facilitate open communication and evaluative feedback on simulation exercises and education, for students to be industry ready and educative content to be applicable to real world nursing.”
A Registered Nurse for 32 years, Ms Andrus has brought a huge depth of experience to make learning 'real world' through virtual world scenarios
She has broadened her scope to include all aspects of practice education and practice based learning for students.
Ms Andrus has won multiple awards for teaching over her career, including a joint Australian Award for University Teaching 2016: Citation for Outstanding Contributions to Student Learning and a joint Murdoch University Vice Chancellor's Award for Teaching Excellence in Teaching.
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