College
of Nursing to recruit rural nurses to Web program
By Lynn
Melton
Faculty
in the UNM College of Nursing will use a $650,000 grant from
the federal Health Resources and Services Administration to
recruit nurses from throughout New Mexico to advance their educations
via the Web and help them stick with the program until they
get their degrees.
Having
to travel to Albuquerque for more education is bad for the nurses
throughout the state and the facilities they work in,
said Geoff Shuster, associate professor in the UNM College of
Nursing. The facilities lose the expertise of these nurses,
and the nurses lose income and time with their families.
It
is important for New Mexico and the University of New Mexico
to be able to offer programs that educate in place,
Shuster said.
UNMs
Web program offers a Bachelors of Science in Nursing (BSN)
curriculum tailored to registered nurses (RNs) who already earned
their associate degrees at local community colleges. Shuster
and Gloria Birkholz, another UNM College of Nursing professor,
will recruit them to the RN to BSN program through
advertising, letters, face-to-face meetings in rural communities,
an 800 telephone line and a website.
UNM also
offers a complete Web-based masters of science in nursing
(MSN) program that can be accelerated with courses in the RN-BSN
program.
The professors
will help the students stick with the program by regularly seeking
feedback about what works and what doesnt, and revising
the program accordingly.
The RN
to BSN program focuses on critical thinking, leadership, management,
community health and public policy skills that enhance
a nurses competence and are ideal to teach via the Web,
Shuster said. More highly-educated nurses are needed in todays
increasingly complex healthcare settings, he added.
Nurses
with BSN and MSN degrees also are able to take leadership positions
within their organizations, Birkholz said, and nurses with MSN
degrees are able to fill the need for faculty at the community
colleges that provide Associate Degree nursing education and
want to increase the number of students they graduate.
A group
of industry representatives studying the states nursing
shortage recently concluded that to begin to solve the shortage,
New Mexico must double the number of students who graduate from
the states nursing schools each year.
Currently
about 11 percent, the shortage could reach 57 percent by the
year 2025 if nothing is done to address it, according to projections
from the federal Health Resources and Services Administration.
While some
private institutions have offered similar degrees via the Web,
Shuster and Birkholz hope to attract students who might have
found those programs too expensive. UNMs online web based
program costs the same as the courses on-campus in Albuquerque,
plus a technical fee per course.
For
more information about the UNM College of Nursing, visit http://hsc.unm.edu/consg/
or call 1-800-690-0934.