What Does a Nurse Educator Do?

Nurse educators fill a lot of roles: instructor, professor, research scientist, clinical instructor, dean, and more. They teach, research, publish, advocate, mentor, and govern. In short, they train the next generation of nurses while working to advance practice and improve patient care.

Career Overview

Becoming a nurse educator takes experience, advanced education, and persistence. As of 2024, about 74,250 postsecondary nursing instructors were working in the U.S., most in academic settings such as junior colleges, universities, and professional schools, with the largest share at four-year institutions.

Teaching Roles by Education Level

What you can teach tracks with your degree:

• Junior or community college: you prepare students to become RNs or LPNs/LVNs. Expect to need at least an MSN. In rural areas or regions with severe shortages, some schools hire instructors with a BSN, but plan on a graduate degree.
• Four-year college or university (undergraduate): you prepare students for a BSN. A doctorate is strongly preferred; a master's is the minimum.
• Graduate level: to teach master's or doctoral students, you need a doctorate.

Certification is not required, but it is worth having. It can raise your pay and your odds of landing competitive positions, and employers treat it as a mark of expertise.

What the Job Involves

First and foremost, you teach aspiring nurses about patient care. Beyond that the role takes many forms: teaching and conducting research at a university, teaching clinical skills while caring for patients, guiding students through their first clinical rotations at a research hospital, or training nurses on new protocols for a large medical group.

Typical responsibilities, depending on specialty and level:

• Planning and teaching curriculum
• Lecturing and leading class discussions
• Overseeing independent study
• Supervising lab and clinical work
• Evaluating and grading student work
• Advising students on academic and career issues
• Mentoring and serving as a role model
• Overseeing graduate projects, dissertations, and research
• Serving on department committees and developing programs
• Conducting research and publishing
• Staying current on nursing practice
• Recruiting students and conducting community outreach

Mentoring

Mentoring is central to the job. The interpersonal connection it creates is what lets nurses develop fully and do their best work with patients. Nursing runs on mentorship, and as an educator you get to shape who the next generation of nurses becomes.

Leadership

Nurse educators are expected to lead, to step up and advocate for change in practice and patient care. Many move into executive leadership and policy roles over time. If you have built rapport with a patient in three minutes and guided them through a hard moment, you already have the core skill: you can walk into any leader's office and make the case for what nurses and patients need.

What Nurse Educators Teach

It depends on your students, expertise, education, and program. A few examples:

• Bachelor's programs: core classes like nutrition, introduction to clinical nursing, and health assessment.
• Master's programs: advanced courses like advanced nursing practice, organizational leadership, and advanced information management.
• Doctoral level: working with DNP candidates on advanced patient care, or mentoring PhD candidates through research projects.

Where Nurse Educators Work

Most work in academia. Others teach at hospitals or at business, technical, and trade schools. The largest concentrations are at colleges, universities, and professional schools, followed by junior colleges, with smaller numbers at general medical and surgical hospitals, technical and trade schools, and educational support services.

The students you teach follow the setting:

• Colleges, universities, professional schools: undergraduates, graduate students, PhD candidates, research students, continuing education students
• Junior colleges: prospective RNs, ADN students, LPN/LVN students, ADN-to-BSN students, continuing education students
• General medical and surgical hospitals: BSN students, graduate students, RNs
• Technical and trade schools: prospective RNs, LPN/LVN students, continuing education students
• Business and management training: administrators, department heads, informatics and data students, continuing education students

Roles by Title

• Clinical nurse educator: teaches the hands-on clinical components of nursing in a university, lab, hospital, home care, or community health setting. Usually holds a graduate degree.
• Nursing instructor: teaches patient care in the classroom to nursing students and to nurses in hospital clinical units. Usually holds a graduate degree.
• Professor of nursing: teaches at a college or university, advises and mentors students, and may research and publish. A doctorate is strongly preferred.
• Simulation lab director: maintains the lab and runs clinical skills training for a nursing program or hospital education group. Usually holds a graduate degree.
• Dean of nursing: manages administration, sets priorities, develops programs, and helps shape long-term university planning and policy. A doctorate is required.

Salary

The BLS median annual wage for postsecondary nursing instructors is $79,940, with most earning between $47,950 and $130,040. Pay varies with education, experience, workplace, location, and position.