Since its founding more than 130 years ago, Chatham College has earned a reputation for providing its students with a high-quality learning experience at its Shadyside, Pennsylvania campus. Now the College is taking this same level of learning online by providing continuous education courses for students all across the country.

“For students in the health care field, online learning provides a great opportunity for professional development,” said Stephen Anspacher, vice-president, Chatham College School of Continuing Education. “Taking online courses enables students to put themselves in a position to move up in their careers or to explore other facets of the health care industry without having to leave their current jobs.”

Chatham College currently offers a number of online degree programs in the health care field, and is launching even more this fall. These include an RN-to-Bachelor of Science in Nursing; Master of Arts in Wellness; Master of Arts in Gerontology; Master of Education in Health; Master of Physician Assistant (post-professional); Master of Health Science and a Professional Doctorate of Occupational Therapy (OTD). While most courses are available to anyone with a bachelor’s degree, some, like the OTD, Physician’s Assistant and RN-to-Bachelor of Science in Nursing, require that students be licensed, and the OTD also requires a master’s degree.

“One of the main things that differentiates our programs from other online graduate programs is our open-entry admissions process that makes it easier for busy adults to gain admission to the program,” said Anspacher. “There are no complicated applications to fill out or tests to take; in fact, students can often start within one day of applying.”

There are many benefits to taking advanced courses through an online program, according to student Joanie Campsie, who has been part of Chatham College’s RN-to-Bachelor of Science in Nursing program for nine months. “Because it is an accelerated program, I will be able to finish it in about half the time of a conventional program,” she said. “And because it’s online, I can continue to work full-time while I’m taking it.”

Campsie says she most likes the flexibility of the program, which allows her to set her own parameters. “Another thing I like about it is that when you post your papers on the discussion board, you get a lot of feedback from other students about your work,” she said. “You wouldn’t get this kind of sharing with your peers in a typical ‘brick-and-mortars’ class, where the only person who would see your work is the professor.”

According to Anspacher, online courses are set up to offer the same benefits of traditional classes, including a small student-to-professor ratio of about 15 to 18 people. Instructors mediate the learning environment electronically, and courses require the same reading as their on-ground counterparts. Students are expected to log on roughly three to five hours per week, as well as work independently.

Campsie, who hopes to enter a nurse anesthesia program after receiving her degree from Chatham College, says that she believes online courses help to develop self-discipline. “People shouldn’t think that this is just a correspondence course—it really isn’t,” she said. “It requires a lot of independent learning, and you have to be motivated. There’s no one to push you but yourself.”

Most of Chatham’s health care programs take between 12 and 18 months to complete, and the cost per credit is the same as an on-ground course, with credits ranging from $583 each for an undergraduate course to $622 per credit for graduate courses. Most are three-credit courses.

“In addition to all of the advantages of taking an online course, such as the convenience and flexibility of working within your own schedule, students at Chatham can also take advantage of all of the other benefits of higher education, including financial aid, and bookstore and library support,” said Anspacher. “We make it easy to get back into the classroom.”

And easier to move up in the health care industry. “In the next 10 to 15 years, we are going to see a tremendous boom in health services occupations,” said Anspacher. “This is a great time for career professionals to get the training they need to position themselves for success.”



The Nova Southeastern University Nursing Department has received a grant from Blue Cross Blue Shield Foundation of Florida to begin a 36-credit MSN designed for the working nurse executive who holds a bachelor’s degree in any field. Nurses in director-level positions or above may complete this online program in as little as 18 months. In this program, the nurse executive will complete course assignments designed specifically meet real workplace issues related to JACHO accreditation, magnet status, and fiscal and human resource management issues. The new MSN track was developed in response to American Nurses Credentialing Center (ANCC) new requirement that Chief Nursing Officers in Magnet facilities hold a bachelor’s or master’s degree in nursing. Nurse executives in Florida hospitals may receive tuition assistance through this grant.



Cedars Medical Center selects 3 Employees for New Emerging Leadership Program

Over a period of several months, under the leadership and direction of Beth Brill, HCA East Florida Division HR Vice President, and Charlene Ingwell, RN, MSN, Director of Workforce Development and Organizational Development, a group of Chief Nursing Officers and Human Resource leaders from the HCA East Florida Division developed a program to address future succession planning. The program, known as The Emerging Leadership Program, was designed to grow, groom, and develop future leaders and began in August 2006. In total, there are 12 interns in the program, representing 5 of the 13 hospitals and 2 from IRL in the East Florida Division.

Top Row (l-r): Avril March, Daphne Charles, Pamela Gordon.
Bottom Row (l-r): Gary Mcclelland, Kim Mccartney, Jorge Toledo

Once the curriculum was developed, the Program was advertised internally to employees in all East Florida Hospitals. Immediately, employees started sending in their applications. At Cedars, the applicants were asked to participate in panel interviews with Associate Vice Presidents, Nursing Directors, and Staff Nurses. At Cedars Medical Center, 3 RN’s were accepted into the program – Kim Mccartney, RN, MSN, Gary McClelland, RN, and Jorge Toledo, RN.

The Emerging Leaders have each been paired up with a preceptor who will guide them through the program for the next year. Kim’s preceptor is Daphne Charles, RN, Nursing Director for one of Cedars’ Orthopedic Units. Gary’s preceptor is Avril March, RN, MSN, Nursing Director for one of Cedars’ Acute Care Units. And Jorge’s preceptor is Pamela Gordon, RN, Nursing Director for Cedars’ inpatient Dermatology Unit. Over the next year these preceptors will play a significant role in the success of Cedars’ Emerging Leaders. Mentors and interns meet with the CNO every other week to monitor the progress of the intern, plan for upcoming experiences and projects, and support the leadership roles of these individuals.

Each month Kim, Gary and Jorge attend didactic leadership training at the East Florida Division Office. They are given assignments to complete in the hospital setting, once they return to the facility. The assignments correspond to the information and education that they receive during their didactic training.

Kim, Gary, and Jorge began this program in August of 2006. After their completion of the program in August of 2007, they will be eligible to apply for any Nursing Director position at Cedars Medical Center and any Nursing Director position at any of the 13 East Florida Division Facilities based on their qualifications.



In the late 1800s nursing students enrolled in training schools and spent their entire education as an apprentice in a hospital. When they graduated they were not hired by hospitals, they engaged in private duty nursing. Hospitals didn’t worry about recruiting and retaining nurses; they simply created their own training schools to get free labor. Flash forward a few more decades and, for the first time, nurses could get a graduate degree in a college setting. Graduate nurses were hired by hospitals and three wars would emphasize the shortages of well-prepared nurses.

While we in academe have celebrated the transition of nursing education into colleges and universities, we must now face the cruel facts. We are unable to produce nurses without the assistance of hospitals and other healthcare institutions. We cannot function as separate entities any longer. There is too much at stake.

When interest was dwindling in the profession of nursing, Johnson & Johnson created an ad campaign that was very successful – so successful, that thousands of qualified applicants continue to be turned away. We are making little progress in the goal to enroll and graduate more nurses. What seems to be the problem? The two most commonly reported reasons according to the Florida Center for Nursing are a critical shortage of qualified nursing faculty and limited clinical slots. While hospitals are open 24 hours a day, seven days a week, they are over-run with nursing students from well-established and newly opened nursing programs. Hospital administrators promise every school that if they expand, they can accommodate their new students. Sounds simple, but it is very complicated to get all the clinical spaces every school needs for their entire student body.

Nursing students at all levels (LPN, RNs from associate and baccalaureate degree programs) need clinical experiences, and their faculty are competing for fewer slots. If nurses on a specific unit are not perceived as supportive and interested in students, they become barriers to recruitment upon graduation. Who wants to work with grouchy and impatient nurses? While recruitment into nursing schools is no longer the problem, recruitment to certain units or hospitals continues.

Retention is an equal challenge. We are hearing that graduates are leaving the profession within three years of graduation. We in academe are very discouraged that we have accepted and educated students who are not committed to the profession. Did we waste that slot or was the environment too toxic? The paradigm for nursing practice has not changed since the early 1970s when team nursing was introduced. While we in academic would like to blame hospitals, let us not forget that we have not changed our teaching methods for decades.

Dr. Patricia Benner, known for her work published as From Novice to Expert, is working to change that. She is trying to convince educators that teaching students to memorize signs and symptoms of every disease, while memorizing drug actions and side effects, will no longer be adequate. Students must learn to critically think their way through patient situations that target the most pressing medical diagnoses, not the obscure diseases that are rarely encountered. While we applaud her in theory, until NCLEX changes the licensing exam to embrace this new thinking, we will not deter from our methods that yield high board scores.

So, we are equally at fault and finger pointing no longer works. What can we do to make sure the state has all the qualified nurses it needs now and within the next 5-10 years when the boomers will retire? We must work together to identify qualified and experienced nursing who can serve as clinical and classroom instructors. This means nurses will need to be released from their regular patient assignments in order to teach and/or supervise students. Nursing schools need to invest in orienting and mentoring these nurses to become competent faculty. Hospitals need to invest in the education and mentoring of their nurse managers, as research is demonstrating they are the key to staff retention. Dissatisfied nurses leave their nurse manager on a specific unit, not the hospital at large.

There are graduate programs across the state that can academically prepare current and future nurse managers, but nurses need encouragement and support from hospital administrators in order to enroll and complete the program. Nursing schools need to revitalize their programs, methods of offering their programs, and use of innovative teaching strategies. The technologically savvy student is not thrilled with lecture format. Hospitals need to create supportive environments for novice nurses and aging nurses who need fewer hours and more attention to ergonomics.

As partners we need to revolutionize nursing education and the clinical environment. Generation X and Y will rely heavily on technology to access information and communicate with others. Let’s face the facts: There are few nurses interested in becoming nurse managers or nurse educators. We have what the other one needs to succeed. We can’t move forward until we move together.



The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) announced a new scholars program to develop the next generation of nurse leaders in academia and boost the stature of junior faculty in nursing schools. The RWJF Nurse Faculty Scholars program will provide $28 million over the next five years to outstanding junior nursing faculty to help them advance in their fields and seek faculty positions earlier in their careers by providing mentorship, leadership training, salary and research support.

Despite a rise in applicants, nursing schools around the U.S. turn away thousands of prospective students from baccalaureate and masters programs because of an acute shortage of faculty and clinical preceptors, training sites, space and funding constraints. Since the stature of nursing schools and the promotion of nursing faculty are dependent on the quality of the nursing faculty’s scholarly and/or research pursuits, the Nurse Faculty Scholars program will work to strengthen the link between institutional reputation and faculty success by providing career development and other opportunities for outstanding junior faculty.

Scholars will be given opportunities to develop a research program and other scholarly activities; work closely with institutional and national mentors; participate in leadership training; and network with scholars, experts and colleagues in their field and other related fields. Scholars also will be able to gain much-needed protected time to get the critical skills needed for a successful career in academic nursing.

“Universities are turning away thousands of qualified applicants to nursing schools each year because they lack the faculty to teach them. We have a pipeline problem. We need to fill that pipeline or we all will suffer the consequences,” said RWJF President and CEO Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, M.D., M.B.A. “We’re committed to supporting the next generation of nursing leaders and encouraging more nurses to seek faculty positions earlier in their careers. Recruiting more nurse educators to the classroom and retaining them in academia is critical if we want to successfully address the nursing shortage.”

There are also not enough nurses lined up to fill positions that will be vacated by retiring faculty, and the Nurse Faculty Scholars program will aim to encourage junior nurse faculty to continue on in their roles as educators.

“Our intent is to retain the most talented junior faculty we have and create outstanding role models so that more nurses might choose nursing academia as a career,” said RWJF Senior Program Officer Susan Hassmiller, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N.

The program will be run out of the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing. Jacquelyn C. Campbell, Ph.D., R.N., F.A.A.N., Anna D. Wolf chair and professor in the Johns Hopkins University School of Nursing, respectively, will direct the five-year program.

The program will award up to $350,000 for three years to each RWJF Nurse Faculty Scholar; up to 15 scholars will be selected each year. Applicants must be junior faculty members with at least two but no more than five years of experience in a faculty role. Candidates who completed their doctoral degree within 10 years of receiving their initial nursing degree are encouraged to apply.