Nursing by Degrees — From ADN to BSN
Sunday September 30, 2007
E-mail to a friend
| 
Print This |
Select Text Size:
advertisement
The American Association of Colleges of Nurses strongly supports such programs and backs a trend in some states to let nursing students obtain BSN degrees at some community colleges, often in partnership with four-year institutions. In most states, however, students enter upper level programs through broad articulation agreements that insure the seamless transfer of their community college credits to the school offering the BSN.
In California and 17 other states, school-to-school articulation agreements exist to facilitate credit transfer from community colleges to universities with BSN programs. Generally, the pacts allow for the transfer of 60 semester credits, which is consistent with agreements between two- and four-year institutions for other academic disciplines.
Sharon Johnson, RN, PhD, associate degree nursing program director at Santa Rosa Junior College says the state’s articulation program lets community college grads transfer to certain universities with the knowledge that most of their credits will be accepted. “They only have to complete upper level courses.”
About 62% of Santa Rosa’s nursing students apply for BSN programs during their last semester, usually at nearby Sonoma State University in Rohnert Park, Johnson says. One-third of the 85 students who enroll annually in the associate degree program also have a BA degree in another field, and some qualify for a fast-track curriculum to a master’s degree, bypassing the BSN.
Boosting BSNs
“We prepare nurses well for direct patient care, probably better than anybody, but if they want to become a supervisor, educator, or public health nurse, they need an advanced degree,” Johnson says. “From day one, we encourage all our students to get their BSN.”
With $600,000 in two-year capacity building and enrollment grants, Santa Rosa JC is enrolling 60 students each in spring and fall classes in 2006 using a selection process that has made the school one of the top performers in the state with a low 10% attrition rate and a 97% NCLEX pass rate.
Johnson says ADN graduates usually take jobs as RNs at local hospitals and pursue their BSN degrees by attending classes part-time and through online and distance learning.
At CSU San Marcos, a two-year, part-time RN to BSN is being launched in the fall of 2007 with an initial class of 24 to 27 students, says Laurie Lindeneau, advisor and outreach coordinator for the school’s Health and Human Services Department. She expects most applicants will be working nurses with ADN degrees from community colleges in San Diego County. “The program is designed so nurses can work and come to school a couple days a week in the late afternoon or evening,” Lindeneau says.
Long distance degrees
California State University, Fullerton has 387 students in its BSN program, all of them RNs with a community college ADN degree, but 232 of them aren’t walking to classes on campus. Instead, they’re working at hospitals throughout the state and taking a blend of videoconference and online courses.
“Nurses choose our distance education program primarily because it’s so convenient,” says Jo-Anne Andre, RN, MSN, the school’s director of distance education. “Courses are frequently offered on-site where they’re employed and done in a cohort model one evening per week.”
Andre says the part-time distance program gives nurses a BSN in three years through a unique combination of learning through interactive video broadcasts, on-line curriculum, and face-to-face physical assessments by school instructors who travel to the nurse’s workplace. Those attending campus classes can get a BSN in two years with flexible scheduling that includes late afternoon and evening courses.
The distance education program has doubled in enrollment since starting five years ago and videoconference courses are now held at selected Kaiser hospitals statewide as well as Mission Hospital in Mission Viejo, St. Joseph’s Hospital in Orange, Children’s Hospital in Los Angeles, and Anaheim Memorial Hospital.
Pushing higher
“There’s a lot of interest in the program,” Andre says, adding that some hospitals require a certain number of nurses with BSNs who can be promoted or put in managerial positions. “I would think there’s a big push for nurses to get BSNs.”
The AACN says future nurses need to go beyond the associate degree criteria that makes them good bedside nurses because of the growing demands of the profession. “BSN nurses are prized for their skills in critical thinking, leadership, case management, and health promotion, and for their ability to practice across a variety of inpatient and outpatient settings,” states a recent AACN position paper. “Clinical settings across the country are differentiating practice and advertising positions that either require or prefer the BSN for employment.”
John Leighty is a freelance writer for NurseWeek. To comment on this story, send e-mail to editorca@nurseweek.com.
For more information visit the California Board of Registered Nursing website at: www.rn.ca.gov.
