The UOIT-Durham College collaborative Nursing Program received a major grant in the first round of the Clinical Simulation Initiative funded by the Ministry of Health and Long-term Care ($780,000). During the course of this funding, the Faculty of Health Sciences completed a number of important educational and research initiatives that helped us understand how and why to integrate simulations into curricula and course structures.

There is convincing literature that simulation technology supports different types of learners by providing non-threatening realistic situations with opportunity to engage in self-paced, interdependent learning to develop solutions to actual clinical problems.

There is a rapidly growing body of work related to the use of simulations (Ravers, 2002). In the Health Sciences, a recent cluster of studies has focused on the use of simulations to meet clinical objectives (Haskvitz & Koop, 2004), the use of computerized patient simulations (Feingold, Calaluce, & Kallen, 2004), the challenges of implementing new technologies in nursing education (Brady, 2004), and planning and implementation of simulation-based educational practices (Seropian, Brown, & Gavilanes, 2004a, 2004b).