29 Sep 2020 Partners boosting nurse retention
When the University of Central Arkansas and Conway Regional Health System formed the Partnership for Nursing Clinical Excellence a couple of years ago, the goal was to provide scholarships and work experiences that would retain more nurses in the local health care market.
It’s a program that has paid immediate dividends according to Susan Gatto, director of the UCA School of Nursing.
“We’re in our third round of students,” she said. “The first round, we only had three students because it was new and all that. Those three are employed at Conway Regional; they’ve been there a year and they’re still employed there and staying, which is exactly what we wanted.
“The second year, we helped eight students who were all hired at Conway Regional. Currently, we have 16 students who are in school receiving (scholarship) assistance. That is just phenomenal! Conway Regional gets nurses, we get student scholarships. It’s perfect.”
Nursing graduates do not lack employment opportunities these days. A nationwide shortage of nurses guarantees many can go wherever they want and have no trouble finding positions in hospitals, clinics and doctors’ offices. From the start, the UCA-Conway Regional partnership was designed to help retain more of this nursing talent locally.
“We started having conversations around something that could be beneficial for both facilities,” said Angie Longing, chief nursing officer for Conway Regional Health System. “Of course for us, a pipeline of new nurses was certainly our top priority from the agreement. But it really was a group that came together and started trying to identify how it could mutually benefit both places.”
Under the terms of the partnership, the program awards $2,500 in scholarship money per semester – $5,000 per year – to students as they complete the final four semesters of a Bachelor of Science in Nursing at the UCA School of Nursing. In exchange, the recipients commit to two years of employment at Conway Regional following graduation.
Longing said the relationship with UCA students begins well before graduation which allows the prospective nurses time to acclimate to Conway Regional’s culture and work environment prior to their final job assignment.
“What makes this appealing to scholarship recipients is the School of Nursing at UCA tries to make Conway Regional their primary clinical site. So, they can count on coming here for their nursing experience,” she said. “They start getting integrated into our culture and the things that we do in nursing over those two years of nursing school.
“We also offer them patient care tech positions while they’re still in school. They’re automatically given a position with us and that’s another way of acclimating them to Conway Regional.”
The two institutions have partnered on other projects in the past and UCA grads are well-represented throughout Conway Regional’s ranks, including Longing herself who earned her nursing degree there.
Gatto, who was one of Longing’s college instructors, said this history of cooperative action is a big part of how the program came together and why it has been so successful.
“There’s a lot of potential here and it’s really exciting,” Gatto said. “It’s not that this idea is particularly unique; there are similar partnerships going on in the state. But what makes our partnership different is we’re not just stopping at money and scholarships. We’ve gone beyond that.
“The hospital is applying for Magnet status and the things that we’ve done together are going to help Conway Regional achieve that. That’s wonderful. That’s national recognition that’s really difficult to get. Meanwhile, we’re looking for innovative ways to provide high-quality clinical experiences for our students. So, this spirit of innovation is what makes our partnerships different.”
Longing said the community of Conway and the surrounding areas served by the hospital are among the primary beneficiaries of the program’s success. “In this day and age there is a shortage [of nurses] across the board,” she said. “Nurses are mobile; there’s been a lot of travel needs, especially during this time of COVID, where nurses will take an assignment at a very high rate of pay. It makes it very difficult for us to keep all of our positions filled.
“That’s why it’s very important for us to have partnerships like this with a steady stream of nurses coming to us. And, it’s very important for us to be a best place to work so they want to stay with us. We were named the Best Place to Work the last three years in a row by Modern Healthcare Magazine and we work hard to maintain that culture. If you can retain a nurse after their first year in the workforce, it certainly helps your chances of keeping them for the long term.”
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