VPRS 18218 Mental Deficiency Nurse Training Summary Cards

This series consists of cards which document progress by Mental Deficiency Nursing (previously known as mental retardation nursing) students towards completion of their training.In order to qualify and be entitled to be registered as a mental deficiency nurse by the Victorian Nursing Council, students were required to complete a mixture of experience based practical work and course work and to meet minimum time requirements working and attending course sessions.Correspondence filed with the cards indicates that these records were maintained at Children's Cottages, Kew. The cards indicate the hospitals or training centres at which the students were placed or being trained and include: Mental Hospital, Kew; Kew Children's Cottages; St. Nicholas Hospital; Janefield Training Centre; Sunbury ; Travancore; Pleasant Creek, Stawell; and Royal Park. This represents evidence that the collection of cards is not a Children's Cottages record and has been attributed to the department as a central record of mental deficiency nurse training.There are three sequences of cards in the P1 consignment. One relates to students who completed the training. The second relates to students whose training was discontinued for some reason before it could be completed. The third sequence, located in front of the first sequence, is smaller and relates to students who were current in the period 1982-85. Most of these cards record only partial completion of training which indicates that this card system was most likely superseded by another system by about 1985 or 1986.Information varies on cards created at different times and may be recorded on both sides or one side. Information may include:Personal- Student name- date and place of birth,- Hospital at which the student was placed for training- education standard,- entrance test (result),- Concession (in case of break in training, period of time approved) and Reason for concession- Certificates (if any relevant are held)Progress summary:- First year: PTS and Examination (records dates and results)- Second year: Nursing Block, Activities Block and Examination (records dates and results)- Third year: Nursing Block and Examination (records dates and results)- Termination (if training is discontinued, the date of discontinuation and perhaps a reason will be recorded)Record of attendance- Recorded in columns or a table are the hours attended for each item in the progress summary list above, against each of the subjects required to be completed.In a few cases, copies of correspondence associated with individual students have been attached to the students' cards. A number of pieces of correspondence may be found, unsorted, at the beginning of the alphabetical sequences of cards.