The aim of this study is to assess the pre-registration preparation of nurses as a means for producing women and men capable of doing new things, not simply repeating what other generations had done. The issues which are examined are:-(1) The purposes of nurse education (11) The extant forms of knowledge (111) The nature of teacher/student relationships in the process of learning. The study was carried out in three stages:- (1) Analysis of the literature from 1947 to 1963 by abstracting and utilising grounded theory approaches to identify the essential issues.(11) Opinion survey of student nurses utilising content and structural analysis of the audio-taped recordings of interviews to develop a theory of nurse education in the 1980's,(ill) Experimental testing of one operational hypothesis describing the effect of teacher behaviours on the student nurse’s clinical decision making. It is concluded that the pre-registration preparation of nurses is not an educational experience on the grounds that the extant forms of knowledge and the prevalent teacher/student relationships are inconsistent with the production of a critical, reflective and self-reliant practitioner. Because of this, the recommendations of UKCC Project 2000 must be carefully planned and closely monitored if the problems of the theory/practice gap are to be minimised rather than exacerbated.