Midwifery Mentorship: Mentee Perspective

The Exploring Australian Midwifery Students' Experiences study involved using an appreciative inquiry approach that enabled the research team to discover what matters and works well from the perspective of midwifery students, midwives, and midwifery managers and to use this knowledge to create enhanced experiences in the future. Appreciative inquiry has a four-phase inquiry process of Discover, Envision, Co-create, and Embed that offers a methodology for learning in and from practice. Creating a supportive learning environment is important to assist midwifery students to flourish in the complex health environments in which they work and provide care. The Senses Framework was used as an analytical lens that focused on understanding what midwifery students valued as important in their learning environments. It was important for the mentees to receive timely feedback, to be heard, to be able to work in a safe environment, to be able to ask questions, to value consistency, to be supported, and to be shown how to do things. The mentor asking the student questions enabled the student to reflect on their clinical practice.