Spring Break
Crowded Accelerated Nursing Program
Heather Anuta
Issue date: 3/4/09 Section: News
WATCH a video about the Accelerated Nursing program.Accelerated Nursing Professor Tim Myers acts as a patient for his students.
Myers is the only professor in the College of Nursing that teaches only classes for the Accelerated Program.
The Accelerated Nursing program is for students who already have a degree, but go back to school to become a nurse.
They graduate in fifteen months, versus the traditional four years.
But that's not all that differs between Accelerated and traditional nursing students.
"Accelerated students not only want to get the A, they want to know what they need for practice," Myers said. "They want to know now what they need to know for practice because they are putting their lives on hold to come back to school."
Myers recognizes the difference in Accelerated students and applies those difference in the classroom.
"Often times they are what we call adult learners," Myers said. "Meaning that they want to know a lot of information and they're self directed compared to if you went to a traditional classroom you may get a lot of lecture. If you come to one of my classrooms you're going to get a lot of discussion about the material."
Classes spend a lot of time in the lab working on simulated patients.
With up to 30 students in the lab at some times, things are getting crowded.
The program is running out of room.
Because of lab space, clinical space and faculty availability, acceptance into the program is limited.
Only thirty students are admitted each semester out of over 100 applicants.
Advisor Jay Hays says the college is looking for ways to meet the needs of the growing number of applicants.
For the first time this summer, the program is expanding the number of students it accepts.
"This summer we are admitting fifty students in the program," Hays said. "We will have 30 students here at the Kent campus like we always do, and we've got an
arrangement with University Hospitals in Cleveland to take twenty students and they'll take all of their classes at the University Hospital campus.
The growing number of students in the Accelerated Nursing Program will likely help the nation-wide nursing shortage.
Because these students graduate in less time than traditional students, they will be working sooner too.
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