Clinical educators

Use this page to find out more about being a clinical educator:

Educating and learning in the workplace
Most physiotherapists have the opportunity, at various stages throughout their career, to support the learning of others in the workplace and those learners may be health professional students, junior staff, peers, other professionals, carers or patients. This is a really valuable role that many physiotherapists enjoy increasingly as they discover just how successfully fulfilling the role contributes to their own continuing professional, and personal, development.

Getting involved
Interest in being a workplace or practice-based educator usually develops through becoming involved with qualifying students on placements and in supporting the learning of junior staff, or engaging in peer learning, most commonly by gaining progressive experience in the role of clinical educator.

This role is essential to developing the next generation of physiotherapists and influencing attitudes towards continuing professional development (CPD). You can encourage your students to:

• reflect on their practice
• document their learning from clinical placements
• apply their learning into new practice experiences.

This will help to ensure they become competent practitioners and will embed this process of CPD into their practice and allow them to continue on as autonomous effective practitioners once they have qualified. As all students have to successfully complete 1000 hours of supervised clinical practice before qualifying there is a pressing need for all physiotherapists to facilitate student learning.

In recognition of this, in 2000 CSP Council agreed five key principles as a basis for good practice in practice-based learning, including that:

• Clinical education is part of the responsibility and role of all clinical practitioners.
• Anywhere a physiotherapist works is potentially suitable for a clinical education placement as a means of gaining a broad range of skills.
  (CSP Council minutes C005, Minute 355 (1))

Getting support in the role of clinical educator
All universities offer a range of ongoing activities to prepare, support and update all clinical educators who offer placements to their students and these activities provide an obvious way for you to evidence your own continuing professional development.

Gaining experience
If you are interested in gaining experience as a clinical educator have a preliminary discussion about possible options with your line manager and the link tutor of the higher education institution who have placements in your service.

Gaining recognition
If the role of clinical educator is an aspect of work that you already find especially stimulating and rewarding you may like to consider becoming an Accredited Clinical Educator (ACE): find out more about the ACE scheme.