What do people think nurses are? Does anyone believe they walk in off the streets with no skills, knowledge or experience and get the job because they are nice people? All Registered General Nurses and Registered Mental Nurses in the UK are qualified to do the job. In the past they did a two year diploma. Nowadays they are doing a three year degree. It's about ensuring they have the skills and knowledge. The experience still builds up on the job as a result of practical application of the skills and knowledge.

I am a manager of a mental health team. We take nursing students on placement throughout the year. They are studying for their nursing degree. However, to say that the existence of the degree (which is not new but has been around for some years, by the way) is moving nurses from the realms of the practical to the realms of academia is pure hyperbole. A large percentage of the time spent at college is spent on practical placements on wards and community teams, where nursing students have to satisfactorily demonstrate they have gained the competencies to carry out their duties safely and effectively. Whilst they are on placement they are mentored by experienced nurses working on the team they are attached to and who have completed training in mentoring. They also recieve supervision from the college.

More and more degrees are vocational rather than academic and the nursing degree is an example of that.

In mental health, nurses need to know a great deal about medication management and administration. They are the ones with day-to-day responsibility for the care of patients, who in the community might only see their psychiatrist every three to six months. This level of responsibilty requires adequate training and skills, which is what the degree provides. To work on my team, nurses need to have at least a diploma and preferably a degree along with a minimum of two years post-qualifying experience and must be able to demonstrate evidence of continuous professional development on the job. For my service users I wouldn't settle for anything less. We don't want nurses who think they know it all and have nothing left to learn, because they are usually the dangerous ones, the jobsworths and the incompetent.

Many psychiatric nurses then go on to do further training either part time whilst working or full time. They are often the most forward thinking and dynamic of mental health practitioners and recognise the importance of life long learning and professional development in order to provide the best possible service to patients. On my team I have nurses who have trained as independent nurse prescribers, cognitive behavioural therapists, family intervention therapists, motiovational enhancement therapists, and so on. I have nurses who have contributed to research projects that have led to improved practice and enhanced patient care. I have a friend - not on my team -who has studied in his own time for a phD in nursing, is a nurse consultant who runs a groundbreaking service for people with severe mental illness and drug problems, who has in the past won the Nurse of the Year award for his work. Yet he is still a man who holds regular clinics doing face-to-face work with patients many would have written off as beyond help. This didn't come about simply through him being caring (which he is) and well meaning, but also through being hardworking and understanding the value of ongoing education. He is also a good example of why the academic and the practical are not mutually exclusive.

Nusing auxillaries (and in the community, support workers and recovery workers) still provide a lot of the hands-on practical support patients need and they perform a vital function. However they do not do this in isolation, but in partnership with highly trained and specialised nursing colleagues. And even so, the auxillaries are still expected to attend and benefit from training and professional development. One of the best ones on my team has left his job this year to train - ant the age of 40- as nurse. We're really proud of him, but he says it is working on a team that values learning that has given him the confidence to study for the first time since he left school 24 years ago.

Nusing degrees? As an insider I say absolutely. Anything to continue to raise standards.