Expectations for Professional Behaviors for Nursing Students

Nursing students are held to a high level of professional conduct.

Plagiarism
Academic Integrity Concerns
Discrimination: The unfair or prejudicial treatment of people and groups based on characteristics such as race, gender, age, or sexual orientation. (American Psychological Association (2022), Discrimination: What it is, and how to cope.)
Incivility: Engaging in one or more rude, discourteous, or disrespectful actions that may or may not have a negative intent behind them. (American Nurses’ Association (n.d.) Violence, Incivility, & Bullying.)
Bullying: Engaging in repeated, unwanted, harmful actions intended to humiliate, offend, and cause distress in the recipient. (American Nurses’ Association (n.d.) Violence, Incivility, & Bullying.)
Unethical Use of Social Networks: Communicating negative, harmful, demeaning, and libelous comments, photographs, etc. about students, faculty, staff, clinical affiliates, SONHS, Aspen University, or anyone else associated with Aspen University, including HIPPA-protected information.
Nurse-Client Relationships: Students must assume personal responsibility for being in
physical and mental condition to give safe nursing care and for the knowledge and skills

necessary to give this care.
- Unacceptable behaviors include, but are not limited to:
- Providing client care in a predictably unsafe or harmful manner, for example:
  - carrying out a procedure without competence or without guidance of a qualified person.
  - willfully or intentionally carrying out physical and/or mental harm to a client.
  - exhibiting careless or negligent behavior in connection with the care of a client.
  - refusing to assume the assigned and necessary care of a client and failing to inform the faculty with immediacy so that an alternative measure for care can be found.
- Disrespecting the privacy of a client, classmate, faculty, or institution:
  - using the full name of a client in a written assignment and/or removing any data generated by the clinical facility of any sort and in any form and by any means (electronic; photographs; paper copies) from the clinical area.
  - discussing confidential information in inappropriate areas, such as elevators, cafeteria, parking structures, etc.
  - discussing confidential information about a client with third parties who do not have a clear and legitimate need to know.
- Falsifying client records or fabricating client experiences.
- Failing to report omission of or error in treatments or medications.
Disruptive Behavior in the Learning Environment: Conduct that is hostile, uncivil, disrespectful of the rights and property of others, denotes a clear uncooperative demeanor with Aspen University or SONHS policy or any behavior that obstructs or disrupts the learning environment (e.g., offensive language to include cursing, harassment, bullying, repeated outbursts which disrupts the flow of instruction, excessive talking amongst peers verbal, written or via chat, or the use of any electronic device which disturbs others).