The meanings of evaluation practice in nursing education.

This study analyzed the meanings of evaluation practice in competence-based nursing education through discursive practices and production of meanings in daily routine. Data were collected with a focal group composed of seven professors from a nursing program in Marília, SP, Brazil. It could be acknowledged, during data analysis, that most of the linguistic repertories refer to the traditional mode of evaluation and to the competence notion based on the French constructivist framework. However, repertories producing meanings related to the innovation of the evaluation method, based on democratic evaluation and on the dialogical competence framework, are also observed.