Resources and News
Key Publications and Resources
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) awards $82 million to Strengthen Nursing Workforce
October 18, 2011
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) through its Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) has allocated $82 million to the Nursing Scholarship Program and the Nursing Education Loan Repayment Program. These programs provide qualified nurses as well as nursing students and faculty with financial support and loan repayment assistance in exchange for service in facilities with a marked shortage of nurses. The funds are expected to support more than 1,700 awards through both programs.
Read HERE for more detailed information about the program, including a listing of awards by state.
Johns Hopkins University Announces New Accelerated Second-degree Program
October 18, 2011
Influenced in part by the Institute of Medicine’s 2010 report “The Future of Nursing, Leading Change, Advancing Health,” Johns Hopkins University (JHU) has decided to offer only accelerated Bachelor of Science options for those who hold a bachelor’s degree in another discipline. According to Sandra Angell, associate dean for student affairs: “We are finding that with each pool of applicants for our bachelor’s program, those who hold a previous degree are in the clear majority-and their numbers continue to grow.” These students enter the nursing education program with diverse backgrounds and experiences and tend to be well-prepared and highly motivated students. All JHU accelerated options can lead to a master’s degree.
Click HERE for more information about the new program.
University of Pennsylvania Introduces BSN-to-PhD Program to Shorten Pathway to Nursing Doctorate
The Hillman Scholars Program in Nursing Innovation, a new BSN-to-PhD program at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing, offers an intensive curriculum that incorporates interdisciplinary education and research career development starting at the undergraduate level. This program was created—in partnership with the Rita and Alex Hillman Foundation—as a response to the concern over the lengthy pathway to a PhD typical for the nursing profession. The program aims to provide a shortened, more integrated alternative for qualified students by shortening the time from entering nursing school to completing a doctorate to about seven years. Students in the program benefit from intensive oversight with faculty and colleagues by forming close and ongoing relationships with faculty mentors, becoming part of active research teams in the university, and participating in colloquia and other activities under the guidance of their mentors. For more information on this new program, click here.
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) awards $82 million to Strengthen Nursing Workforce
The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) through its Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) has allocated $82 million to the Nursing Scholarship Program and the Nursing Education Loan Repayment Program. These programs provide qualified nurses as well as nursing students and faculty with financial support and loan repayment assistance in exchange for service in facilities with a marked shortage of nurses. The funds are expected to support more than 1,700 awards through both programs.
Read HERE for more detailed information about the program, including a listing of awards by state.
Johns Hopkins University Announces New Accelerated Second-degree Program
Influenced in part by the Institute of Medicine’s 2010 report “The Future of Nursing, Leading Change, Advancing Health,” Johns Hopkins University (JHU) has decided to offer only accelerated Bachelor of Science options for those who hold a bachelor’s degree in another discipline. According to Sandra Angell, associate dean for student affairs: “We are finding that with each pool of applicants for our bachelor’s program, those who hold a previous degree are in the clear majority-and their numbers continue to grow.” These students enter the nursing education program with diverse backgrounds and experiences and tend to be well-prepared and highly motivated students. All JHU accelerated options can lead to a master’s degree.
Click HERE for more information about the new program.
RWJF’s Charting Nursing’s Future Publishes Two Policy Briefs In Its Four-part Series Focusing On Implementing The IOM’s Future Of Nursing Report Recommendations
January 2012
As part of its Charting Nursing’s Future initiative, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation has launched a four-part miniseries of briefing papers that focus on implementing the recommendations set forth in Institute of Medicine (IOM) report (2010), “The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health.” Since August 2011, two papers have been released: “Implementing the IOM Future of Nursing Report—Part 1: How to Dramatically Increase the Formal Education of America’s Nursing Workforce by 2020” (August 2011) and, “Implementing the IOM Future of Nursing Report — Part II: The Potential of Interprofessional Collaborative Care to Improve Safety and Quality” (November 2011). The first report looks at the report’s educational progression recommendations and summarizes the ways in which key players around the country are responding. Specifically, the report calls for increasing the percentage of nurses holding the bachelor of science in nursing (BSN) degree or higher to 80 and for doubling the number of nurses with doctorates by 2020. The second brief in the series examines ways to implement the Future of Nursing Recommendations by examining interprofessional practice trends, the types of educational transformation needed to prepare health professionals to provide collaborative care, as well as the policies necessary to assure its delivery.
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s New Funding Opportunity – Future of Nursing: Campaign for Action
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) is coordinating a unique, multi-funder initiative to identify, generate, synthesize and disseminate evidence essential to informing efforts to implement the recommendations outlined in the Institute of Medicine (IOM) report, “The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health” and to contribute to Campaign for Action’s goal of advancing comprehensive change in health care for patients and the country. To learn more about this Research Agenda and to submit a grant application, visit the Future of Nursing website here. The purpose of this activity is to increase and focus national attention on a common research agenda related to the IOM recommendations and to facilitate and coordinate funding activity across a range of funders of nursing research.
The American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) Endorse New Standards for Master’s Education in Nursing
Nursing schools affiliated with the AACN voted at the Spring 2011 Annual Meeting to endorse new Essentials of Master’s Education in Nursing to reflect current and future nursing practice at the master’s level, which demands expert application of evidence-based practices, quality improvement methods, outcomes measurement, systems knowledge, and leadership skills. The new Essentials update an earlier version adopted in 1996. For those nurses seeking a terminal degree, the new competency standards will prepare graduates to move seamlessly into research or practice-focused doctoral programs.
The development of the new Master’s Essentials began in September 2008, when a national task force – comprised of expert nurses in academia and practice and chaired by Dr. Joanne Warner, dean of the University of Portland School of Nursing – used a national consensus-building process to derive the new standards. The adoption of the new Essentials comes at a time when leading authorities, including the Institute of Medicine, are calling for educational innovations to enhance the preparation of nurses for contemporary practice.
Read more on the AACN website.
EIN Inaugural Grantee Meeting in New Mexico
EIN hosted its inaugural meeting with grantees from March 30th – April 1, 2011, in Santa Ana Pueblo, New Mexico, just north of Albuquerque. The meeting’s theme was “Optimizing the Usefulness of Findings,” where EIN grantees and invited national experts worked together to meet the meeting’s goals, which included strategies to ensure fidelity of implementation and to disseminate and communicate project findings to a broad range of stakeholder audiences. Dr. Michael Bleich, Dean for the School of Nursing at Oregon Health & Science University, presented the keynote address: “Evaluating Innovations in Nursing: Bridging Health Care Reform, IOM Future of Nursing and Public Need.”
The American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) Notes President Obama’s Commitment to Nursing Education and Research Programs
AACN leadership applauded the Obama Administration’s support and continued commitment to nursing by increasing funding for the Nursing Workforce Development Programs, and the National Institute of Nursing Research in his FY 2012 budget proposal. Read more about the 2012 budget, even as Congress debates a deep funding cut to health professions and nursing education in FY 2011.
RWJF Sharing Nursing’s Knowledge Focuses on Nurse Education, Practice and Workforce Trends
Read the latest issue of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s Sharing Nursing’s Knowledge, which features a lead article on the Institute of Medicine’s report on the future of nursing’s call for a “greater emphasis” on increasing diversity of the nursing workforce and ensuring that nurses are able to provide culturally relevant care.
Journal of Nursing Education Guest Editorial, March 2011: Transforming Clinical Education
Read a discussion by Pam Ironside and Angela McNelis about how many nursing faculty continue to grapple with how to create and sustain nursing education innovations in their day-to-day practice and particular contexts. The authors review findings from a recent survey of faculty teaching in prelicensure RN programs.
National Summit on Advancing Health through Nursing (November 30 – December 1, 2010)
Visit the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s The Future of Nursing website to view the archived webcast of presentations and sessions featured at the national summit on Advancing Health through Nursing (November 30 – December 1, 2010) and to acquire resources for organizations to become involved with the Initiative’s implementation efforts.
The summit brought together diverse leaders from around the country to focus on the recommendations of the IOM report, “The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health.” Participants engaged in identifying strategies for implementing the recommendations and discussions about overcoming barriers to implementation. The summit featured Committee Chair Donna E. Shalala, PhD, FAAN; Committee Vice-Chair Linda Burnes Bolton, RN, DrPH, FAAN; Harvey V. Fineberg, MD, PhD, President of the Institute of Medicine; and Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, MD, MBA, President and CEO of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. Dr. Donald Berwick, Administrator of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, was the summit’s keynote speaker.
The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health
On October 5, 2010, the Institute of Medicine (IOM) released its much anticipated report – The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health– following its two-year joint Initiative on the Future of Nursing with The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF). The Initiative was launched to respond to the need to assess and transform the nursing profession – with its over 3 million members representing the largest segment of our country’s health care workforce – and the report’s purpose is to make recommendations for an “action-oriented blueprint for the future of nursing.” Read more about the report: The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health. View the Webcast of the October 5 IOM Report Release. Check back for ongoing updates about the report recommendations as the Committee and nurse leaders move forward with implementation activities.
National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses
The Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) announced in September the release of its report based on its Bureau of Health Professions’ 2008 National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses. The report — The Registered Nurse Population: Findings from the 2008 National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses – is published every four years and includes comparisons from eight recurring surveys, 1980 through 2008. Key highlights from the report related to nursing education include:
- One of the primary barriers to restocking the pool of RNs is a shortage of nursing faculty to meet the growing need to educate new nurses
- The shortage of nursing faculty will grow significantly in the near future with 60 percent of current faculty aged 50 years and older
- The number of RNs with master’s or doctorate degrees rose to 404,163 in 2008, an increase of 46.9 percent from 2000
Health Reform and the Nursing Workforce: Nursing Related Provisions in the Patient Protection and Affordability Care Act (PPACA)
The Center to Champion Nursing and AARP developed a crosswalk to identify the ways in which federal health care reform will have an impact on nurses and the nurse workforce. The table includes provisions in the PPACA related to: education and incentives to produce more nurses; increased demands for highly skilled nurses (e.g., support for nurse managed health centers); quality incentives that are related to nurses; incentives and practice opportunities for nurses; and opportunities for nurse advocates and leaders). Read more about the provisions, type and amount of funding and expected timelines.
Blowing Open the Bottleneck: Designing New Approaches to Increase Nurse Education Capacity
In 2008, the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the Center to Champion Nursing in America, and the U.S. Department of Labor, Employment and Training Administration commissioned a paper entitled: Blowing Open the Bottleneck: Designing New Approaches to Increase Nurse Education Capacity, which provided background for participants attending the national Nursing Education Summit in June 2008. According to CCNA, the purpose of the paper is to provide a concise but comprehensive understanding of the complexity of nursing education and to stimulate innovative thinking in order to implement creative solutions to the challenge of insufficient nursing education capacity.
Five recommendations for pre-licensure clinical nursing education
MacIntyre, R. C., Murray, T. A., Teel, C. S., & Karshmer, J. F. (2009). Five recommendations for pre-licensure clinical nursing education. Journal of Nursing Education, 48(8), 447-453. This article offers five recommendations and analysis to stimulate local, state and national conversations on new approaches to clinical nursing education:
- Re-envision nursing student-staff nurse relationships
- Re-conceptualize the faculty role
- Enhance development for school-based faculty and staff nurses working with students
- Reexamine the depth and breadth of the clinical component
- Strengthen the evidence for best practices in clinical nursing education
The Center to Champion Nursing in America
The Center to Champion Nursing in America (CCNA) has created a catalogue of videos that focus on leading issues in nursing and nursing education. The following link http://www.vimeo.com/7941844 leads to a short video profiling the Dedicated Education Unit (DEU) program at Massachusetts General Hospital as an example of an innovation in clinical nursing education.
Massachusetts Dedicated Education Unit from Champion Nursing on Vimeo.
Forum on the Future of Nursing Education
View the webcast of the February 22, 2010 Forum on the Future of Nursing: Education, hosted by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s (RWJF) Initiative on the Future of Nursing at the Institute of Medicine. This Forum was the third, and final, nationwide forum hosted by the Initiative and was held in Houston at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. The Initiative’s committee invited individuals and organizations to submit written testimony, which might include innovations/models and barriers/opportunities, relevant to issues in nursing education and the overlapping areas of: “what we should teach, how we should teach (methodology), and where we should teach.”
Read “A Summary of the February 2010 Forum on the Future of Nursing: Education – Institute of Medicine” that was released on September 1, 2010. RWJF’s Initiative on the Future of Nursing seeks to build a blueprint for the future of nursing as part of larger efforts to reform the health care system. The information and perspectives discussed at this forum will inform a final report on the future of nursing, expected to be released in October 2010.
Other Nursing National Programs and Initiatives
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) is committed to addressing the nursing shortage by supporting a range of nursing projects and initiatives through its program areas, Building Human Capital and Quality/Equity. Current RWJF nursing programs include:
Interdisciplinary Nursing Quality Research Initiative
To support interdisciplinary studies that address critical knowledge gaps regarding causal linkages between nursing and health care quality and to synthesize, translate and disseminate major findings to key stakeholders.
New Jersey Nursing Initiative
The New Jersey Nursing Initiative (NJNI) is a five-year, $22 million project of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the New Jersey Chamber of Commerce Foundation, working to transform nursing education in the state. Its goal is to ensure that New Jersey has the well prepared, diverse nurse faculty it needs to educate nurses to meet the demand for health and health care in the 21st century.
Nursing Alliance for Quality Care
The mission of the Nursing Alliance for Quality Care (NAQC) is to advance the highest quality, safety and value of consumer-centered health care for all individuals — patients, their families and their communities. A list of alliance members can be found here.
Partners Investing in Nursing’s Future
To support the capacity, involvement and leadership of local foundations and community partners in implementing localized nursing shortage solutions to serve as templates for communities facing similar issues nationwide.
Quality and Safety Education for Nurses
Quality and Safety Education for Nurses (QSEN) is a multi-phase project that was launched in November 2005. QSEN’s overall goal is to address the challenge of preparing future nurses with the knowledge, skills and attitudes (KSA) necessary to continuously improve the quality and safety of the healthcare systems in which they work.
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Executive Nurse Fellows
To provide advanced leadership opportunities for nurses in senior executive roles in health services, public health and nursing education who aspire to lead and shape the U.S. health care system of the future.
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation New Careers in Nursing Scholarship Program
To address the nursing shortage by funding scholarships in accelerated bachelor’s degree programs at nursing schools, with preference given to schools that increase the number of students in these programs or increase enrollment and retention of disadvantaged or minority students.
Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Nurse Faculty Scholars
To increase the stature and academic standing of nursing faculty and draw more nurses to teaching careers by creating a cadre of national leaders in academic nursing through career development awards to outstanding junior nursing faculty.
Center to Champion Nursing in America
The Center to Champion Nursing in America is an initiative of AARP, the AARP Foundation and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The Center, a consumer-driven, national force for change, works to increase the nation’s capacity to educate and retain nurses who are prepared and empowered to positively impact health care access, quality, and costs.
Wisdom at Work: Retaining Experienced Nurses (closed)
Wisdom at Work was an RWJF program launched in 1996 that sought to build an evidence base for what works to retain experienced nurses in hospitals and to develop better understanding of the impact of such interventions. View the program report here.
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation’s New Funding Opportunity – Future of Nursing: Campaign for Action
The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) is coordinating a unique, multi-funder initiative to identify, generate, synthesize and disseminate evidence essential to informing efforts to implement the recommendations outlined in the Institute of Medicine (IOM) report, “The Future of Nursing: Leading Change, Advancing Health” and to contribute to Campaign for Action’s goal of advancing comprehensive change in health care for patients and the country. To learn more about this Research Agenda and to submit a grant application, visit the Future of Nursing website here. The purpose of this activity is to increase and focus national attention on a common research agenda related to the IOM recommendations and to facilitate and coordinate funding activity across a range of funders of nursing research.
