Abstract:

General Nursing Council recruitment and selection guidelines requires passing of an aptitude test by candidates wishing to train as nurses, a prerequisite that has been received with mixed feelings due to the high failure rate inherent with the test. The investigator therefore undertook the study to determine if there was any relationship with passing of the aptitude test and the performance of students during training.

A purposive, retrospective review of records was done and IBM SPSS statistical package, version 20 was used to analyze data.

The findings revealed that passing the aptitude test, was not indicative of definite subsequent passing of the nursing courses by students. In conclusion passing aptitude test was not a determinant of ability of student to pass their nursing examinations.

Keywords: Aptitude, performance, nursing education, regulation.

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