en Nursing Education Nursing Education Original Research Original Research <p> <strong> Background: </strong>Educational clinical environment has an important role in nursing students' learning. Any difference between actual and expected clinical environment will decrease nursing students’ interest in clinical environments and has a negative correlation with their clinical performance. </p><p> <strong> Methods </strong>: This descriptive cross-sectional study is an attempt to compare nursing students'perception of the actual and expected status of clinical environments in medical-surgical wards. </p><p>  Participants of the study were 127 bachelor nursing students of Iran University of Medical Sciences in the internship period. Data gathering instruments were a demographic questionnaire (including sex, age, and grade point average), and the Clinical Learning Environment Inventory (CLEI) originally developed by Professor Chan (2001), in which its modified Farsi version (Actual and Preferred forms) consisting 42 items, 6 scales and 7 items per scale was used. Descriptive and inferential statistics (t-test, paired t-test, ANOVA) were used for data analysis through SPSS version 16. </p><p> <strong> Results </strong>: The results indicated that there were significant differences between the preferred and actual form in all six scales. In other word, comparing with the actual form, the mean scores of all items in the preferred form were higher. The maximum mean difference was in innovation and the highest mean difference was in involvement scale. </p><p> <strong> Conclusion </strong>: It is concluded that nursing students do not have a positive perception of their actual clinical teaching environment and this perception is significantly different from their perception of their expected environment. </p> Clinical learning environment, Nursing education, Nursing student. 110 117 http://mjiri.iums.ac.ir/browse.php?a_code=A-10-1-783&slc_lang=en&sid=1 Shoaleh Bigdeli sbigdeli@alumni.sfu.ca 200319475328460014906 200319475328460014906 No Center for Educational Research in Medical Sciences (CERMS), Department of Medical Education, Faculty of Medicine, Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Vahid Pakpour vahidpakpour@gmail.com 200319475328460014907 200319475328460014907 No Hematology and oncology Research center, Students Research Committee, Tabriz University of Medical Sciences, Tabriz, Iran. Maryam Aalaa maryam_aalaa@yahoo.com 200319475328460014908 200319475328460014908 No Endocrinology and Metabolism Research Center, Endocrinology and Metabolism Clinical Sciences Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Robabeh Shekarabi Shekarabi-R@yahoo.com 200319475328460014909 200319475328460014909 No Center for Nursing Care Research of Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Mahnaz Sanjari sanjarim@yahoo.com 200319475328460014910 200319475328460014910 No Endocrinology and Metabolism Research Center, Endocrinology and Metabolism Clinical Sciences Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Hamid Haghani haghani511@yahoo.com 200319475328460014911 200319475328460014911 No Iran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran. Neda Mehrdad nmehrdad@tums.ac.ir 200319475328460014912 200319475328460014912 Yes Elderly Health Research Center, Endocrinology and Metabolism Population Sciences Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran & Endocrinology and Metabolism Research Center, Endocrinology and Metabolism Clinical Sciences Institute, Tehran University of Medical Sciences, Tehran, Iran.