WANTED: Nursing Faculty
City Council and CUNY partner against the nursing shortage
Mishka Vance
Issue date: 5/1/09 Section: News
City Council Speaker Christine Quinn and CUNY Vice Chancellor and Provost Alexandra Logue have proposed a five-year partnership between CUNY and New York City hospitals so as to provide nursing programs with additional resources to make up for an increasing nurse deficit in the city.
The plan calls for local New York City hospitals to send ten senior nurses each year to teach at a CUNY nursing school. This will allow CUNY nursing programs to admit 100 more nursing students each year.
Still in the proposal stage, the plan will most likely be presented to the City Council as part of the next budget, according to CUNY spokesperson Rita Rodin. It is unclear what schools the proposals will affect, but Rodin said both community and senior CUNY colleges are likely to benefit from the increased availability of nursing faculty.
The health care industry in New York City employs approximately 400,000 workers in more than 70 hospitals. Nursing positions account for 15 percent of all jobs in the health care sector, the largest single occupation in this industry.
Over the past five years, CUNY has doubled the number of nursing graduates from about 800 to approximately 1600 graduates per year.
Despite the increase, New York City and State are facing a shortage of nurses. The statewide vacancy rate for nurses was 8.8 percent in 2007, up from 6.38 percent in 2006, according to a recent study by the Healthcare Association of New York State. According to Payscale.com, a nurse working in New York City currently makes about $28 an hour.
According to some, there is a real need for nurses, not only in the city's hospitals and clinics, but in classrooms as well.
Admissions to nursing programs throughout the CUNY system and other universities are considered especially rigorous. According to a CUNY radio podcast, there are "not enough seats" because there is "not enough faculty." Last year, as per a news story in The Epoch Times, 575 qualified applicants were turned away from CUNY nursing schools because of insufficient nursing faculty and other important resources.
The plan calls for local New York City hospitals to send ten senior nurses each year to teach at a CUNY nursing school. This will allow CUNY nursing programs to admit 100 more nursing students each year.
Still in the proposal stage, the plan will most likely be presented to the City Council as part of the next budget, according to CUNY spokesperson Rita Rodin. It is unclear what schools the proposals will affect, but Rodin said both community and senior CUNY colleges are likely to benefit from the increased availability of nursing faculty.
The health care industry in New York City employs approximately 400,000 workers in more than 70 hospitals. Nursing positions account for 15 percent of all jobs in the health care sector, the largest single occupation in this industry.
Over the past five years, CUNY has doubled the number of nursing graduates from about 800 to approximately 1600 graduates per year.
Despite the increase, New York City and State are facing a shortage of nurses. The statewide vacancy rate for nurses was 8.8 percent in 2007, up from 6.38 percent in 2006, according to a recent study by the Healthcare Association of New York State. According to Payscale.com, a nurse working in New York City currently makes about $28 an hour.
According to some, there is a real need for nurses, not only in the city's hospitals and clinics, but in classrooms as well.
Admissions to nursing programs throughout the CUNY system and other universities are considered especially rigorous. According to a CUNY radio podcast, there are "not enough seats" because there is "not enough faculty." Last year, as per a news story in The Epoch Times, 575 qualified applicants were turned away from CUNY nursing schools because of insufficient nursing faculty and other important resources.
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