Overhaul sought for nursing education
A faculty consortium plans to establish a standard, statewide college curriculum
University of Hawaii nursing faculty statewide have formed a consortium to "reinvent" nursing education at the community colleges and Hilo and Manoa campuses.
The Statewide Nursing Education Consortium will strive to increase the number of nurses required to meet the state's health-care needs, access to nursing education and efficiency in educational preparation of nurses.
"As the only publicly supported nursing education institution in the state, we recognize our responsibility and are optimistic that the public sector will work with us to provide the resources required for nursing workforce development," Mary Boland, UH-Manoa dean of nursing, said in a news release.
The nursing faculty plans to establish a standard, statewide curriculum for nurses at the associate and baccalaureate levels by fall 2008.
Louis Magnussen, interim associate dean of the UH-Manoa School of Nursing and Dental Hygiene, said the nursing faculty agreed a statewide curriculum is needed.
It "will prepare students with competencies to address rapidly changing health-care needs of our population," she said. "It is an exciting effort that will involve moving from traditional teaching to student-centered and simulated learning approaches."
The four community colleges offer an associate degree in nursing; UH-Manoa and UH-Hilo offer baccalaureate degrees.
Normally, students graduating from the community colleges who want further education have to reapply at either of the upper-division campuses.
With the proposed new curriculum, the nurses said, all students will take standard prerequisite courses during their first year and the curriculum will be the same at all campuses the second year.
In the third year of study, students have the option to leave with an associate degree or complete a fourth year of study for a bachelor's degree.