Curriculum Redesign to Build the Moral Courage Values of Accelerated Bachelor’s Degree Nursing Students

The increasing complexities of health care coupled with the decreasing importance of ethical values held by college students, including nursing students, compel nurse educators to step up efforts to strengthen the moral courage values of their students. While the nursing curriculum is the ideal breeding ground for building moral courage values, few studies describe how these values were embedded in any nursing curriculum, much less an accelerated bachelor’s degree in nursing (ABSN) curriculum. This study outlines an ABSN curriculum with teaching-learning activities designed to build moral courage values in its classroom and clinical settings. Faculty perceptions of 29 ABSN students’ honesty, respectfulness, responsibility, fairness, and compassion were surveyed 4 weeks after beginning, and again at the end of the ABSN program. The ABSN exit questionnaire administered annually by the College Office of Institutional Research, assessed the effectiveness of the ABSN curriculum. Of the 20 learning outcomes on the questionnaire, five related to moral courage values. The 5-point response scale ranged from Not at All, to Somewhat, Moderately, Well, and Extremely Well. t-test calculations revealed significant growth for four of the five values surveyed. Honesty, responsibility, fairness, and compassion were each positively significant at the p < .05 level. For the 27 of the 29 ABSN students who responded to the exit questionnaire, the Well and Extremely Well responses ranged from respectfulness and responsibility at 73%, to compassion and honesty at 78%, and fairness at 82%. Teaching-learning activities to build moral courage values successfully promoted the nursing program objective that the student will demonstrate proficient clinical, technological, and ethical competence in the delivery and management of health care.