1 Introduction Mental health nursing is a difficult area to recruit graduates globally (Adams et al. 2021; Rice et al. 2019) and Australia, including the state of Victoria, is currently plagued by a workforce shortage in this specialty (State of Victoria 2019). While there are many reasons why a student will choose to enter a specialty nursing area, a positive clinical placement experience has been identified as a significant motivator (Alexander et al. 2024; Foster et al. 2021).
