 "Photo: Megan Winn / Staff Photographer")
 "Photo: Glenn Connelly / Assistant Photo Editor")
The San Diego State School of Nursing is one of 16 California colleges that received grants on Thursday as part of an effort to address the statewide medical professional shortage.
Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger awarded SDSU with nearly $125,000, which is the highest amount possible for special projects funding.
"As we focus on reforming California's broken health care system, we must ensure that we have the workforce to meet the growing demand for nurses," Schwarzenegger said in a press release. "These grants will help expand enrollment in nursing programs and attract students from within the communities the nursing programs serve."
The money will go toward developing more efficient courses and creating innovative nurse educator programs on campus, said School of Nursing Director Catherine Todero, Ph.D.
"There's a terrific nursing shortage, but there's an even bigger faculty shortage," Todero said. "Hopefully we can appeal to faculty from around the area to access our programs and also to nursing students who are coming back with the expectation that they would become nursing faculty."
Todero, who drafted the proposal to request the grant money, said she is "thrilled" and "feels fortunate" that SDSU was chosen.
Grants were separated into two categories of funding: capitation and special projects. Capitation money directs funds specifically for enrollment and requires schools to take in additional students, while special projects require proposals for specific new methods, Todero said.
"The competition was so great," she said. "There were more people asking and fewer special projects being funded. You had to have a creative or innovative idea that was worthy of funding."
Nursing senior Yvette Lanot said she feels SDSU deserved the grant.
"Our nursing program sticks to high standards and is really competitive," Lanot said. "Everything the school provides already is wonderful, but it's nice to know that now it can do even more."
When she first spoke to The Daily Aztec in October, Todero said increasing program funding was one of her main goals when she signed on as director in August 2006.
"Now what I think this will do is give us the opportunity to brainstorm about models that would be more efficient for educating a greater numbers of students," Todero said. "We can develop education distribution at the graduate level and provide an environment where faculty can learn new techniques. It's a way to extend our teaching capabilities."
This year, more than $3 million in grants were made available by the Song-Brown Act, a law that passed in 1973 to ensure the annual funding and expansion of state health care training programs.
"Our goal is to increase nursing school opportunities, particularly in medically under-served communities, and improve the training of nurses so they can provide the highest quality of care," Schwarzenneger said in the press release.
The money will be distributed in two installments during the next two years, and SDSU is expected to receive the first installment by July 1, Todero said.
Be the first to comment on this article!