Investigation of nursing students' learner skills for the 21st century

The research was carried out with the aim of examining 21st century learner skills of nursing students, it is descriptive, relationship-seeking, and cross-sectional research qualification. The universe of the study consisted of nursing students in the first, second, third and fourth grades in the nursing departments of the Nursing Faculties and Health Sciences Faculties of two state universities and four foundation universities in Istanbul, which are well-established according to their years of establishment, affiliated to the Higher Education Council in the 2021-2022 academic year (N=2960). The sample of the study was determined by purposive and stratified sampling method, and it was aimed to reach the maximum number of nursing students that could be reached, and the study was conducted with 1328 nursing students who volunteered to participate (n=1328). Data were collected using the "Information Form" developed to determine the sociodemographic characteristics of nursing students, the "Visual Analog Scale (VAS)", which includes students' ratings of their participation in social and scientific activities, interest in global problems, career planning, following technological developments, technology and media literacy, and the "21st Century Learner Skills Using Scale (21CLSUS). Data were analyzed using IBM SPSS Statistics 26 program. The percentage, minimum, maximum, average, and standard deviation analyses, and internal consistency analysis (cronbach α) were used in the research analysis, whereas variation coefficient analysis, and Shapiro-Wilk test, parametric and non-parametric analysis methods, Student-t test, and one-way variance analysis test were used in the normal distribution of the data. The results were evaluated at the 95% confidence interval and the significance level of p<0.05. The mean age of the nursing students who participated in the study was 20.65±1.54, the students were mostly female (84.0%) and grew up in a nuclear family (85.6%), lived in the family home (57.5%) and did not work (91.9%), mostly define themselves as social (50.5%) and open to innovation (47.4%), were mostly second-year students (28.1%), attended public universities (59.2%), those who studied at foundation universities were mostly 50% scholarship students (69.6%) and they knew a foreign language (47.2%). In the analysis of the nursing students' responses to the VAS statements, it was determined that the students received the highest score from the statement "I use social media to obtain information" (7.57±2.34) and the lowest score from the statement "I take an active role in student clubs" (2.93±2.72). When the mean scores of the nursing students from the 21CLSUS and its sub-dimensions were examined, it was determined that they received an average score of 3.49±.51 from the total scale, the lowest mean score was from the "Collaboration and Flexibility Skills" sub-dimension (3.06±.74) and the highest mean score was from the "Cognitive Skills" sub-dimension (3.93±.51). According to these results, it was observed that the 21st century skills of nursing students were at a medium level. It was found that students' 21st century skills were affected by gender, working status, self-identification status, university type, and knowing a foreign language, but were not affected by family structure, place of residence, class level, and age variables. When the relationship between 21CLSUS scores and VAS scores was examined, it was found that there was a weak positive significant relationship between nursing students' 21st century skills and their use of social media while obtaining information, following technological developments, following global problems, participating in social activities, and participating in scientific programs. In the comparisons made with the sub-dimensions, it was found that there was a week positive significant relationship between the Cognitive Skills and thinking that they were technologically literate, following certificate programs for their personal and professional development and participating in social responsibility projects; between the Collaboration and Flexibility Skills and making use of social media while obtaining information, making career planning related to their profession, following technological developments, following global problems, participating in social activities, being media literate; and between the Innovation Skills and participating in social activities. It is thought that structuring nursing education programs for the 21st century skills, increasing courses, projects and activities that will raise attitudes and awareness about 21st century skills in nursing education programs and contributing to the development of students' 21st century skills