Missouri Western takes first steps to offering MSN

[cougarnurse]

FYI: Nursing begins work on master?s program

The nursing department at Missouri Western State University has taken the first step in developing a graduate program by receiving approval from the Missouri Department of Higher Education to start work on the program.

Designed primarily to prepare nurses within the region to enter leadership and management roles within a variety of different health care facilities, the program will offer a Master of Science in nursing and health care leadership degree and is currently scheduled to begin in the fall of 2010.

According to Kathleen O’Connor-Andrews, associate professor and chair of the nursing department, there have been informal discussions about the program over the course of several years within the department and the community. Such discussions became serious after the nursing department met with such community partners as Heartland Health, who encouraged the development of the program.

“We were really encouraged by Heartland to pursue a master’s,” Andrews said. “They really felt like the most important need for that level of advanced education would be for those people that wanted to move up in management and administration. So we started thinking about…health care leadership.”

Starting last year, the department met with Jeanne Daffron, who was serving as the interim dean of graduate studies at that time, to get the ball rolling on making the concept a reality by helping to draft a basic proposal of the program that was then presented to the Graduate Council, a group comprised of faculty members that approve policies, procedures and programs.

Brian Cronk, professor of psychology and current interim dean of graduate studies, was on the Graduate Council that approved the program.

[The Council said], “yeah, this is a good idea that is academically rigorous enough and we think there’s student demand,” Cronk said.

Andrews reveals that she’s already received a handful of inquiries from local and regional nurses who have expressed interest in what the program can offer them.

“[The] emphasis is on applied science and that’s absolutely what nursing is,” Andrews said. “Our degree program will fit into that structure very well. The students will be able to take classes with a multi-disciplinary group. As a nurse leader, that multi-disciplinary exposure is very important.”

Barbara McDowell, a junior/senior at Western, has only been part of the nursing undergraduate program for a year, but hopes to be part of the graduate program in the near future.

“I’m actually very excited about it,” McDowell said. “I think it provides a good opportunity…It took me by surprise that we’re going to have one [here.]”

However, there is still much work to be done. The proposal that was approved was a basic skeleton of the program. Now, it’s up to the nursing department to fill out such details as the courses that will be offered, who will teach the courses and what the requirements will be to enter the program.

Cronk firmly believes that the end result will be a great asset not only to the nurses who take part in the program but also to the community at large.

“I think it will help put nurses in the community that have a broader set of skills [better] understand more of the big picture than just what they do as a nurse,” Cronk said. “The more people that understand the big picture, the better.”