Still WANTED: Nursing Faculty City Council grants CUNY nursing programs $500,000 in effort to ease nursing shortage in New York City
Mishka Vance
Issue date: 9/2/09 Section: News
This July, at a press conference at Bellevue Hospital, City Council Speaker Christine Quinn announced that she was awarding CUNY nursing programs with a grant for $500,000. The money will be used to support nurses teaching at Lehman College and Borough of Manhattan Community College, as well as to fund the new Hunter-Bellevue accelerated nursing program.
News that the New York City Council and CUNY were working on a proposal to increase the city's supply of nurses was reported by The Envoy this past May. Speaker Quinn and CUNY Vice Chancellor and Provost Alexandra Logue announced the partnership between CUNY and New York City hospitals as a way to provide nursing programs with additional resources.
Under the CUNY-City Council agreement, ten more experienced nurses will provide instruction to nursing students throughout the CUNY system. The increase in faculty will allow 500 more nursing students to graduate and join the workforce over five years.
According to a recent assessment by the American Hospital Association, the shortage of healthcare professionals is the "most critical manpower problem facing hospitals across America."
Additionally, in a July 2009 Huffington Post article, New York Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand wrote, "As Congress focuses on comprehensive health care reform, one thing needs to be clear: We cannot fix healthcare if we do not address America's nursing shortage."
New York is even more pressed for nurses than the United States at large, with fewer registered nurses per capita than the rest of the nation. It is estimated that New York will need 7,000 more nurses than it will have by 2020. Moreover, Statistics suggest that out of New York's 63,000 nurses, 17 percent are over the age of 55 and likely to retire soon.
Yet, almost 600 qualified nursing applicants were turned away from CUNY nursing programs last year because nursing schools lacked educational capacity. The real problem, according to Senator Gillibrand, is that nursing institutions "just do not have the faculty and physical space available to train the nurses we need."
News that the New York City Council and CUNY were working on a proposal to increase the city's supply of nurses was reported by The Envoy this past May. Speaker Quinn and CUNY Vice Chancellor and Provost Alexandra Logue announced the partnership between CUNY and New York City hospitals as a way to provide nursing programs with additional resources.
Under the CUNY-City Council agreement, ten more experienced nurses will provide instruction to nursing students throughout the CUNY system. The increase in faculty will allow 500 more nursing students to graduate and join the workforce over five years.
According to a recent assessment by the American Hospital Association, the shortage of healthcare professionals is the "most critical manpower problem facing hospitals across America."
Additionally, in a July 2009 Huffington Post article, New York Democratic Senator Kirsten Gillibrand wrote, "As Congress focuses on comprehensive health care reform, one thing needs to be clear: We cannot fix healthcare if we do not address America's nursing shortage."
New York is even more pressed for nurses than the United States at large, with fewer registered nurses per capita than the rest of the nation. It is estimated that New York will need 7,000 more nurses than it will have by 2020. Moreover, Statistics suggest that out of New York's 63,000 nurses, 17 percent are over the age of 55 and likely to retire soon.
Yet, almost 600 qualified nursing applicants were turned away from CUNY nursing programs last year because nursing schools lacked educational capacity. The real problem, according to Senator Gillibrand, is that nursing institutions "just do not have the faculty and physical space available to train the nurses we need."
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James Lee
posted 9/13/09 @ 11:35 PM EST
Here's the flip side to the story:
If the statistics say that there is a nursing shortage in New York City, then there is a nursing shortage.
However, many New York City area hospitals have relatively tight finances and are in a hiring freeze. (Continued…)
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