Jordan is one of the Middle Eastern countries with a population of 6 249 000 (Department of Jordanian Statistics 2011). In comparison to other countries in the region, the overall health condition in Jordan is considered one of the best, with a
well-established healthcare system (Ajlouni 2011). The Faculty of Nursing at the University of Jordan was established
in 1972 as the first university-level education in nursing (Sultan 1998). With the development of the first baccalaureate
nursing programme, the need for nursing educators at a graduate level was apparent. Accordingly, ‘the university started to offer scholarships to the first graduates of the BSc programme to pursue their graduate education on well-established masters and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) programmes abroad, mainly in the USA. This strategy was initially successful in establishing doctoral-prepared nursing faculty’ (Zahran 2012, p. 382).