Pathways and Perceptions: A Life Span Model for Nursing Work Force Development

The Community Foundation of the Great River Bend

Genesis Health System; Trinity Regional Health System; St. Ambrose University; Quad City Health Initiative; Trinity College of Nursing and Health Sciences; Eastern Iowa Community College District; Black Hawk College; University of Illinois – Chicago; Western Illinois University; Scott County Health Department; Rock Island Health Department; United Township Area Career Center; Davenport School District

Mary Clarke, Project Director; clarke@genesishealth.com, (563) 421-7662

Lori Rodrigues-Fisher, Project Sustainability Liaison; Rodrigl2@ihs.org,

(309) 779-7730

Matt Mendenhall, Project Administrator; mattmendenhall@cfgrb.org, (563) 326-2840

Brief Project Synopsis: 

Pathways and Perceptions: A Life Span Model for Nursing Work Force Development will initially focus on strengthening the educational infrastructure and faculty development in the Quad Cities area (QCA) community. The project is driven by an expected nursing workforce shortage created by greater population demand for health care services, an aging nursing workforce and the shortage of nursing faculty to educate future nurses. Local barriers to increasing nursing school enrollments include shortage of faculty, limited facilities and lack of clinical placement opportunities.  In the QCA, an informal survey of nursing programs found 15 faculty openings and 35 anticipated retirements by 2020 among the 75 current full-time nursing faculty; and 650 applications locally for 400 student spots.

Our project team represents nursing and community leaders from two magnet status health systems, six nursing education colleges and universities, and health agencies located in a bi-state community. A significant aspect of our work will be to continually frame the opportunities that benefit all partners. We believe that through collaboration we can develop an expanded and enhanced network of clinical sites, to include public health, industrial health, and school health settings, and will create a premier nursing education region. At the same time, practicing nurses in those settings will be supported in instructing the next generation of nurses. Our goal is to advance existing regional excellence in nursing education by promoting the transfer of passion for and expertise in nursing practice.

Project Goals and Objectives:

In order to recruit, train and retain a qualified and diverse nursing workforce, we seek to strengthen the nursing educational infrastructure in the QC community by:

• Increasing the availability of qualified nursing instructors (i.e., create a pool of master’s prepared nurses who are trained to serve as adjunct faculty in local nursing education programs)
• Increasing the availability of clinical preceptor sites (i.e., identify non traditional and expand clinical sites through community dialogue and coordination)
• Developing the local nursing education lab infrastructure (i.e., explore the possibility of creating regional simulation and virtual learning labs)