Todd Campbell is a registered nurse at HCA Virginia’s Johnston-Willis Hospital, as well as a participant in the RN-to-B.S. degree program. (Photo by Chet Strange)
By 2020, it is recommended that 80 percent of American nurses have a bachelor’s degree or higher, according to “The Future of Nursing” report released by the Institute of Medicine in 2010.
That statistic has proved worrisome to many registered nurses without bachelor’s degrees.
Todd Campbell was one. He is a registered nurse at HCA Virginia’s Johnston-Willis Hospital who had graduated in 2013 with an associate’s degree from Charlottesville’s Piedmont Virginia Community College, and he felt nervous about his future. “It was a bit scary hearing [the report’s] conclusion,” he says. “For nurses like me who can’t walk away from our employment and go to school full time, there was this feeling of ‘What’s going to happen to me?’ ”
Campbell found a solution through a partnership between HCA Virginia and Virginia Commonwealth University School of Nursing that groups HCA nurses in a cohort as they continue their education through VCU’s RN to B.S. program. The nursing school’s online degree program allows registered nurses with a diploma or associate’s degree to earn a bachelor’s degree while maintaining full-time employment.
VCU, along with many other nursing schools in the nation, offers a cohort learning structure under the partnership. Students in each cohort take all of the same courses together at the same time, meaning they learn together, complete assignments together and graduate together. Though the program is online, professors set up at least one meeting a semester for the cohort to come together in person.
The first cohort of 13 students, of which Campbell is a member, began classes in fall 2016 and is on track to graduate in summer 2018. The nurses will complete the program through part-time study, taking two courses each semester for five semesters and one course in the sixth semester, for a total of 11 courses with 32 academic credits.
It’s a perfect program for Campbell. “I had wanted to go back to school for a long time, but I was looking for the right program,” he says. “When I heard about the partnership between VCU and HCA, I immediately became interested. It’s so refreshing to take part in a flexible, manageable program so I can continue to focus on my work.”
VCU School of Nursing Dean Jean Giddens says the partnership provides benefits for all parties involved by helping HCA Virginia achieve a higher percentage of nurses with a bachelor’s degrees in their system.
“At the VCU School of Nursing, it is critical that we provide the workforce for all employers across the state,” she says. “In turn, many employers are interested in making sure they provide academic progression for their nurses — having the highest-educated workforce … possible translates to the best patient care.”
Donna Adams is a nurse manager at Parham Doctors' Hospital, and is taking classes through a learning cohort as part of a partnership between HCA Virginia and the Virginia Commonwealth University School of Nursing. (Photo by Chet Strange)
Donna Adams, a nurse manager at HCA Virginia’s Parham Doctors’ Hospital and a 1982 graduate of J. Sargeant Reynolds Community College, is also part of the first cohort. She says she loves learning in this structure because course discussions are tailored to the context of care within the HCA Virginia health system, which increases the relevance of course material and adds value to the education offered to nurses. In fact, she says the cohort is one of the best groups she’s ever participated in.
“Nursing is all about connecting with patients, and I’m so pleased that we are using evidence-based practice in our cohort to improve our patient care,” she says. “Everything we’re doing is based around what’s best for our patients and how we can translate that into what we are doing at the bedside, which allows patients to get home more quickly and safely and see the best health outcomes.”
Stephanie Neal, HCA Virginia’s vice president of human resources, says nurses within the cohort benefit from the connectedness and accountability of working with peers.
“Having this partnership tied to VCU means that the curriculum is tailored to what we do at HCA,” she says. “It provides a more personal approach rather than nurses simply getting their degrees through a standard [bachelor’s] program. The content is more relatable to the work they’re actually doing on a daily basis.”
HCA provides tuition for the program up front rather than reimbursing the cost later on. “The partnership represents our commitment [to] and investment in our employees,” Neal says. “We are able to financially support their desire for greater education, and our hope is that this translates to commitment and loyalty towards HCA. We see our employees as partners in furthering and growing themselves in the field of health care.”
Giddens says VCU School of Nursing is using this initial cohort to observe and improve the partnership. The school is prepared to enroll as many as 30 HCA nurses each semester.
“If we had three cohorts enrolled every year with 30 people in each, that’s 90 people a year,” she says. “In five years, that equals nearly 500 registered nurses earning their bachelor’s degrees. That can really transform the care our nurses are delivering to their patients.”
