NLN Center for Innovation in Education Excellence

The NLN Center for Innovation in Education Excellence offers a wide range of creative educational simulation and curriculum integration advisory services, teaching and learning resources, and professional development opportunities. As new faculty and seasoned nurse educators engage in excellence in teaching and learning, the continued development of online and virtual products is necessary to both enhance faculty skills and expertise and meet the needs of this contemporary generation of learners. 

The center provides a professional development arena to bring faculty together to thoughtfully and intentionally build modern innovative approaches to teaching and learning. Additionally, the center engages members through maker space activities to move ideas through innovation, scaling, and launching of new products and offerings.

The center's mission is to cultivate, scale, and impact excellence and innovation in nursing education to meet the needs of contemporary learners across the discipline of nursing. The vision is influencing innovation in nursing education excellence globally.

• Innovation is defined as processes that result in large or small, sweeping or gradual change to NLN products and services that introduce something new for the organization (Demiris et al., 2020) and adding value to the teaching learning process. 
• Education Excellence is defined as a process that reflects continuous efforts to make incremental or breakthrough improvement within the context of teaching and learning that are beyond the status quo.

The center hosts two institutes on simulation and the care of vulnerable populations. The Institute for Simulation and Technology and the Institute for the Care of Vulnerable Populations funnel through the center's mission-aligned strategies.

Innovation in Education Excellence Offerings

For novice to expert nurse educators, our innovative products and resources are intended to cultivate and scale cutting-edge teaching and learning resources, community building to expand and support the role of the nurse educator, and evidence-based processes to measure excellence and educational impact.

Simulation Resources – View the Simulation Innovation Resource Center (SIRC)
The Simulation Innovation Resource Center is a resource community of nurse educators who use simulation to promote and evaluate student learning and who dialogue with one another to advance simulation in nursing education. Community members submit HomeGrown Solutions to address tricky issues in simulation.

Courses – View innovative CIEE courses
The Center for Innovation and Education Excellence offers synchronous, asynchronous, and hybrid courses. Underpinned by theory and evidence, the courses consist of diverse teaching strategies aimed at supporting learners in their emergence as competent and caring clinicians.

Podcast episodes – Listen to NLN Nursing EDge Unscripted
The award-winning NLN Nursing EDge Unscripted podcast offers episodes on the how-to of innovation and transformation in nursing education. Each conversation embraces the power of innovation to move educators away from the mundane and mediocre to the interesting and exceptional.

Advancing Care Excellence - View ACE Resources
ACE is an ongoing NLN resource to improve the quality of care for vulnerable or underserved populations. ACE features seven populations. Each population has unfolding cases and teaching strategies.

Leadership development – View the Sim Leader Program
Staff from the Center for Innovation and Education Excellence lead the Leadership Development for Simulation Educators program, offered through the Center for Transformational Leadership. Designed for mid-career simulation nurse educators, this program supports those ready to expand their impact and step into leadership roles within the field of simulation.

Communities – Visit NLN Connect
The Center for Innovation in Education Excellence offers various communities to meet the evolving needs of nurse educators.

• Alumni of the NLN Simulation Leadership Program are invited to participate in the NLN Connect Sim Leader Alumni Community, where members continue to expand and support the role of simulation in nursing education.
• Past participants of the NLN Faculty Intensives course are invited to participate in the NLN Connect Faculty Intensives Alumni Community. This space allows alumni to share resources, insights, and experiences gained during and after their participation in the program.