The Center for Medical Simulation congratulates the simulation and nursing education team at University of Southern Maine and the University of Maine at Augusta on receiving endorsement through the International Nursing Association for Clinical Simulation and Learning Healthcare Simulation Standards Endorsement™ program for the Cornerstone Standards of Prebriefing, Debriefing, Facilitation, and Professional Integrity.

Partnership Through ALPS for Health Professions Schools

Recognizing the opportunity to foster system-wide excellence, the Applied Learning for Performance and Safety (ALPS) team at CMS partnered with UMaine Nursing to help realize their vision. The challenge was to strengthen collaboration and standardization while honoring each campus’s unique culture and resources. The engagement formally began in August 2024 with the first Healthcare Simulation Essentials (HSE) course offered to nursing faculty across the system as a targeted faculty coaching intervention. Several faculty members who had previously completed the HSE course (including Lisa Heald, Shannon Gauvin, and Erin Bellaire) supported this initiative and expanded their own expertise in the process.

Following this foundational work, the Simulation Education Steering Committee (SESC) was established, representing all four campuses and initially led by Dr. Mary Fey and then by Shannon Gauvin and Liz Guerdin. Early priorities centered on faculty development, and workshops were offered on topics such as:

• From Feedback to Coaching With Good Judgment
• SimZones as a Framework for Simulation Curriculum Development
• Implementation of Supportive Assessment: Formative and Summative Assessment in Simulatio

The second HSE course was held in May 2024, drawing 16 faculty participants and further strengthening a shared language and vision for simulation-based education.

With a focus on standardization, the SESC made two pivotal decisions. First, all campuses adopted the Simulation Effectiveness Tool (SET) to collect student feedback on simulation experiences. Although the mechanisms for data collection vary across campuses, this unified metric now allows for shared analysis and benchmarking. Second, the committee committed to a deliberate, phased implementation of the HSSBP, beginning with the “Core Four”: Debriefing, Preparation & Briefing, Facilitation, and Professional Integrity.

The SESC undertook the task of standardizing Preparation and Briefing processes across campuses. A subcommittee developed a suite of resources tailored to varying levels of faculty experience. Through surveys and collaborative design sessions grounded in the concept of Readiness Planning, representatives gathered insights into local practices and created harmonized documents to support consistent, high-quality prebriefing and preparation across the University of Maine System.

These included two versions of a Prebriefing Script—a concise checklist for experienced facilitators and a more detailed guide with sample language for newer faculty—and a Comprehensive Faculty Guide to Prebriefing, outlining the theoretical and practical foundations of effective prebriefing in simulation-based learning. Content from this guide will inform a new Faculty Professional Development Online Course currently under development.

The Faculty Professional Development Online Course standardizes the onboarding of new faculty as they learn to facilitate simulation-based learning experiences in alignment with INACSL’s core four simulation standards, plus the Good Judgment Approach.  Using the Readiness Planning process, core learning outcomes were identified, and programs were designed to target and meet these outcomes.  This process was integrated with the micro-credentialing process at UMaine so that faculty would have a tangible reward at the end of the course that can be added to their CV.  All new faculty will be required to take the course, again strengthening the standardized approach to simulation across the campuses.

CMS nursing faculty specific workshops on UMS campuses have totaled 600 learning hours across more than 50 faculty. 32 nursing faculty have been trained in the Healthcare Simulation Essentials: Design & Debriefing Program with another 18 coming in 2026. As a culmination of this work, the University of Maine at Augusta nursing program will be applying for official INACSL accreditation in March 2026. Additionally, in 2025 the American Nurses Association named Shannon Gauvin one of the top ten nurses in Maine.

The Future of Simulation Advancement

The three-year endorsement recognizes the programs’ demonstrated commitment to evidence-based simulation education and psychologically safe learning environments. In its review, the INACSL committee highlighted the strength and organization of the application, noting the program’s structured DEI review process using the Inclusive Simulation Checklist, robust faculty performance reporting, and clear evidence of implementation, reflection, and continuous improvement.

The application effort was led by Sarah Powelson and Liz Guerdan, with contributions from Suzanne Casey, Tara Casimir, Christina Harris, Leslie Larsen, and Cynthia Randall. Together, the team demonstrated how simulation faculty uphold ethical standards, foster inclusive learning environments, and facilitate guided reflection using validated debriefing frameworks.

The endorsement also reflects the broader simulation advancement work taking place across the University of Maine System through its multi-year partnership with the Center for Medical Simulation. The initiative brings together nursing programs at University of Maine at Augusta, University of Maine at Fort Kent, University of Southern Maine, and the University of Maine School of Nursing to strengthen simulation-based nursing education statewide.

As part of the partnership, faculty across the system have participated in CMS simulation educator training programs designed to standardize and elevate simulation facilitation, debriefing, and learner assessment practices across campuses. The collaboration supports the development of consistent, high-quality simulation experiences intended to prepare nursing students for increasingly complex healthcare environments.

The University of Maine at Fort Kent and the University of Maine School of Nursing are currently in the evidence-gathering stage of the endorsement process. Together, these efforts position the University of Maine System among a growing group of institutions pursuing nationally recognized standards for simulation excellence.

The team from the University of Southern Maine and University of Maine at Augusta will be recognized during an awards presentation at the INACSL26 conference in June 2026.