Addressing the Nurse Faculty Shortage by Supporting Evaluations, Generating Evidence and Disseminating Findings

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Site Map

About Us and Program Overview
Funded Projects
- Our Grantees
Research Findings and Tools
Resources and News
- Key Publications, Resources and Nursing Initiatives
- News on Nursing Education
Contact Us
Grantees and Applicants Log In
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For Grantees and Applicants

Stats & Facts
- A recent analysis of the U.S. Census indicates that the last 10 years have seen a 62% surge of young nurses aged 23 to 26, after the steady decline and prolonged shortage over the past two decades. This finding suggests that the broad-based, national efforts to attract young people into the nursing profession might have averted dire projections of critical shortages. While this is encouraging news, the authors of the study note that regional variation in supply, mismatched specialty training and demands (e.g., outpatient geriatric), and nurse faculty shortage continue to warrant attention and persistent efforts. Read more here, or access the study.
- Data from the AACN’s 2011 survey show that enrollment and graduation rates in the nation’s baccalaureate and post-baccalaureate programs continue to increase. In particular, DNP and PhD programs saw marked increases in enrollment (20.6% and 6.6% in the past year, respectively). On the other hand, in 2011 alone, more than 51,000 qualified applicants were turned away from prelicensure BSN programs because of the continuing shortage of faculty, clinical sites, and funding. Read more about the findings here.
- The U.S. nursing shortage is projected to grow to 260,000 registered nurses by 2025 (Buerhaus et al, Health Affairs (published on-line 12 June 2009).
- According to AACN's Special Survey on Vacant Faculty Positions for Academic Year 2010-2011, the nurse faculty vacancy rate among baccalaureate and graduate nursing programs in the U.S. is 6.9% (up from 6.6%), ending a multi-year trend towards fewer vacancies. The survey found a total of 880 faculty vacancies at 556 nursing schools with baccalaureate and/or graduate programs.
- According to the NLN 2009 Annual Survey of Nursing Programs, nearly one quarter (23.4 percent) of US nursing programs of all types reported receiving more qualified applications than could be accepted in 2008. Among prelicensure programs, there was considerably more unmet demand for admissions.
- Among schools that did not accept all qualified applicants, prelicensure programs reported that lack of clinical placement settings were the biggest impediment to admitting more students. Postlicensure programs were more likely to cite a shortage of faculty as the main obstacle to expansion (NLN 2009 Survey).
- HRSA’s report on The Registered Nurse Population: Findings from the 2008 National Sample Survey of Registered Nurses found that the number of RNs with master’s or doctoral degrees rose to 404,163 in 2008, an increase of 46.9 percent from 2000.
- The HRSA survey report noted that although 13 percent of nurses hold graduate degrees, fewer than 1 percent (28,369) have a doctoral degree in nursing or a nursing-related field, the qualification needed to conduct independent research.
- 43.4% of nursing school faculty are doctorally prepared (AACN’s Special Survey on Vacant Faculty Positions, August 2009).
- HRSA's Bureau of Health Professions stresses that the shortage of nursing faculty will grow significantly in the near future with 60 percent of current faculty 50 years of age or older.
EIN Grantee Awards
- Seven grants (of up to $300,000 each) have been awarded.
- The first cycle of two-year funded projects runs from 2009-2011; the second cycle runs from 2010-2012
Check back often to learn about findings from grantee evaluation projects which will be posted here when they become available.

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© 2009 RWJF Evaluating Innovations in Nursing Education
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