UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — With demand for nurses at an all-time high, Penn State President Eric Barron and two deans from the Ross and Carol Nese College of Nursing will discuss nursing education and how a major gift has benefited Penn State’s program, in the next episode of WPSU’s “Digging Deeper” on Sunday, March 27.
“Digging Deeper” will air at 10:30 a.m. and 6 p.m. on WPSU-TV and can be streamed on live.wpsu.org. WPSU is a Penn State Outreach service.
Penn State’s College of Nursing was renamed the Ross and Carol Nese College of Nursing last summer after the couple pledged $27.125 million to enhance nursing education at the University. Coupled with $17.9 million in matching funds from Penn State, the gift provides a combination of endowed and outright funding for scholarships, faculty and program support, and facilities and equipment.
Laurie Badzek, dean of the college, said COVID-19 has exacerbated a national nursing shortage. At the same time, Penn State receives far more applications each year than its program can currently handle.
The Nese gift will allow the college to upgrade technology and increase its physical classroom space at University Park, and to grow and enrich its program overall, Badzek said. “We are looking at ways that we can add new programs, that we can add new students, and that we can maximize every site in Pennsylvania.”
The college is also focused on improving the health and wellness of nurses, Badzek said.
“This is a very difficult profession and the physical and the mental demands have gone really through the roof with COVID,’’ she said. “We really need to prepare our students, as well as enrich the lives of our own faculty with more health and wellness, more tools and tips to be resilient, to work in a difficult environment.”
The scholarship support the gift provides is especially meaningful, Badzek said. Nursing training is expensive, and 75% of nursing students at Penn State have financial need.
“Ross and Carol really wanted to enable students to leave with less debt,” said Badzek.
Lisa Kitko, the college’s associate dean for graduate education, said many of Penn State’s graduates stay and practice in Pennsylvania in medically underserved areas or federally qualified health centers.
“So they really are helping us achieve not only the mission of the College of Nursing, but also the land-grant mission of the University,” she said.
WPSU’s “Digging Deeper” explores how work being done at the University impacts the broader community. Penn State senior Andrew Destin serves as co-host and rounds out each episode by asking Barron questions that are on the minds of students, faculty, staff and community members.
Visit the WPSU website for more information on central Pennsylvania’s public media station.