Boston-based Mass General Brigham received more than $5.8 million from the Labor Department to expand its nurse educator program.
The hospital received the second-largest grant from the Labor Department's $78 million pool, according to a May 17 system news release.
The hospital plans to use the money to pay full tuition and expenses for 224 nurses in the healthcare system who enroll in one of the institute's three nurse education programs: MS in leadership in nursing education, post-master's certificate in nursing education or continuing professional development certified academic clinical nurse educator preparation course.
"This is what we do — prepare the next generation of nursing leaders; it's what the IHP has been doing for decades and this is simply an extension of that," nursing school dean Kenneth White, PhD, who is also president of the American Academy of Nursing, said in the release. "Focusing on the numbers of nurses is not the only solution; we have to focus on the number of instructors, and that's what this grant is doing."
The program will focus on training nurses who want to teach in nursing programs or be clinical instructors. A new Massachusetts Board of Registration in Nursing regulation requires all nursing faculty to have a master's degree in nursing or a National League for Nursing certification as a nurse educator with expertise in the clinical setting.
The Labor Department's initiative provided grants to 25 universities and hospitals in 17 states.