Five-year immediate-supervisor evaluation of a Master of Science in Nursing Program: a mixed-methods repeated cross-sectional study

Immediate-supervisor evaluations provide a workplace stakeholder perspective on how master-prepared nurses are perceived in professional practice. However, evidence across successive cohorts remains limited, particularly for post-licensure Master of Science in Nursing (MSN) programs, and supervisor ratings cannot distinguish the contribution of graduate education from nurses’ pre-existing professional experience. To characterize immediate supervisors’ ratings of master-prepared nurses’ general professional attributes and advanced nursing practice competencies across five graduating cohorts and to identify stakeholder-informed areas for curriculum review. A convergent mixed-methods repeated cross-sectional secondary analysis was conducted using evaluations from 81 immediate supervisors, each rating one graduate from five cohorts (2019–2020 to 2023–2024; cohort n = 13–19). Item distributions and top-box ratings were summarized. Respondent-level composite scores for Parts I and II were compared across cohorts using Kruskal–Wallis tests, and exploratory ordered-cohort trends were assessed using Kendall’s tau-b. Qualitative feedback from the paper questionnaires was analyzed by response direction and content, with data availability and provenance documented by cohort. Overall Part I and Part II item means ranged from 4.21 to 4.90, with pronounced ceiling effects; top-box proportions across the 16 items ranged from 39.5% for foreign-language proficiency to 90.1% for patient care. The 2023–2024 cohort had the lowest descriptive mean on 14 of 16 items. However, composite scores did not differ significantly across cohorts (Part I: H = 6.299, p = .178; Part II: H = 4.049, p = .399), and exploratory ordered-cohort trends were not statistically significant (Part I: Kendall’s τb = − 0.156, p = .077; Part II: τb = − 0.147, p = .103). Overall workplace performance and future hiring intention were also rated highly (means = 4.74 and 4.86, respectively). Qualitative findings identified clinical-practice integration as a perceived strength and highlighted suggestions concerning foreign-language communication, resilience and stress coping, clinically focused teaching and simulation, academic communication, problem/crisis management, and positive thinking/self-awareness. Immediate supervisors reported favorable perceptions of master-prepared nurses, but pronounced ceiling effects, small cohort sizes, potential selection and rater biases, the absence of baseline or comparison data, and graduates’ substantial prior professional experience limit inferences about changes associated with MSN education or equivalence across cohorts. Supervisor feedback may therefore be most informative as one component of a broader program-evaluation system and as a source of stakeholder-informed considerations for ongoing curriculum review.