Issues concerning competency-based education (CBE) have recently promoted much
discussion and debate throughout most developed countries. This paper provides an
Australian perspective and adds to the wider debate about CBE by deliberating on the
part professional competency standards should play in a university curriculum,
specifically the undergraduate nurse education curriculum. A position is developed by
addressing the following thesis statement: the competency-based approach to nursing
education is an indisputable reality but nursing competencies must not be allowed to
control the curriculum. Some background material is briefly reviewed in order to
situate CBE, nurse education, and nursing competencies in their Australian economic
and socio-political context. The position is then explicated through an examination of
some intersections between nursing competencies and aspects of undergraduate nurse
curriculum making.