Under the provisions of the award, the College will fast-track a cohort of MSN students specializing in acute care, who upon graduation will be committed to teach in the state of Michigan for at least five years. The grant is part of $1.5 million in the state budget designated for the Nursing Corps in fiscal year 2008; Gov. Granholm has recommended the Michigan Department of Labor and Economic Growth include a $10 million line item for the program in the fiscal year 2009 budget, currently under consideration by the state legislature.
Proposed by the governor in her 2007 State of the State address and spearheaded by Michigan Chief Nurse Executive (and WSU College of Nursing alumna) Jeanette Wrona Klemczak, the Nursing Corps supports colleges and universities with existing, accredited baccalaureate, master's and doctoral nursing education programs, aimed at increasing nursing faculty, thus adding new nurses into the workforce.
"We are excited to play an integral role in the implementation of the Nursing Corps," says Barbara K. Redman, PhD, RN, FAAN, dean of the WSU College of Nursing. "It is gratifying to see Michigan joining other states across the country in recognizing that nursing is an essential component to economic development, particularly in this difficult fiscal climate. We hope that this will be a continuing investment in Michigan's future."
The Nursing Corps was created to address Michigan's mounting nursing shortage by rapidly increasing the number of educators who could teach new nurses. The crisis has reached nationwide proportions: According to the American Academy of Colleges of Nursing (AACN), of the 5,283 qualified candidates across the country who were not accepted for baccalaureate, master's and doctoral nursing programs in one recent year, an insufficient number of faculty was cited by 42 percent of schools responding as the reason that applications were denied.