Push for Nursing Diversity Reveals Rich Talent Pool

A program that offers scholarships to students making a career switch to nursing opens up a world of opportunity not only for the students, but for the profession.

Nursing has traditionally been dominated by white women, but since 2008, a scholarship program from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the American Association of Colleges of Nursing has been working to increase diversity in the workforce.

Now, as the New Careers in Nursing Scholarship Program enters its final year, it is yielding lessons for all nurse leaders about the kinds of nursing grads who make the profession more diverse and well-rounded.

"The reason this is important, of course, is because the population of nursing does not really reflect the population at large," says Polly Bednash, PhD, RN, FAAN, CEO of the American Association of Colleges of Nursing and program director of the NCIN. "We are now working very aggressively to have the number of people entering the profession look more like the population of the United States."

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, individuals from ethnic and racial minority groups accounted for 37% of the population in 2012, the AACN reports in a fact sheet about nursing diversity. But people from minority backgrounds represent just 19% of the RN workforce, according to a 2013 survey cited in the fact sheet conducted by the National Council of State Boards of Nursing (NCSBN) and The Forum of State Nursing Workforce Centers. Men are also significantly underrepresented in nursing.

"We need to have a nursing population that represents that same diversity," Bednash says. "That's how you get people the best care."

For instance, the AACN fact sheet cites an April 2000 report prepared by the National Advisory Council on Nurse Education and Practice, which found that "a culturally diverse nursing workforce is essential to meeting the health care needs of the nation and reducing the health disparities that exist among minority populations."

Since 2008, the NCIN program has distributed 3,517 scholarships to students at 130 different schools of nursing. The schools receive grants to support traditionally underrepresented students who are also making a career switch to nursing through an accelerated baccalaureate or master's degree program.

Each NCIN scholarship recipient has already earned a bachelor's degree in another field, and is making a transition to nursing through an accelerated nursing degree program, which prepares students to assume the role of registered nurse in as little as 12-18 months. In addition to the scholarship, the program also provides support to the students throughout their studies.

By targeting underrepresented students who already have bachelor's degrees enter accelerated baccalaureate or graduate nursing programs, the scholarship program not only increases nursing diversity, but also helps to advance the IOM's goal of having 80% of nurses hold a bachelor's degree by 2020. It also introduces into the workforce nurses who are focused, driven, and carry with them the experiences of past careers.

"The individuals who enter these kinds of programs are not just older. They have some life experience [and] have made a very conscience and purposeful career choice… which then commits them in a very different way to the profession," Bednash says.

These "new grads" also know what it's like to have a job and be accountable at work, she says. "We hear from employers that they like these graduates very much."

Bednash says these students make the switch to nursing from a wide variety of other professions, such as literature, biology, art, and psychology. One student owned a car dealership, and another was a ballet dancer.

"It's an enormously diverse group of people," she says.

Moreover, these students are taught and display leadership qualities, something that employers also appreciate, doing things like forming their own alumni group that helps its members with leadership development, Bednash says.

According to Bednash, most also have plans to earn advanced-practice degrees. She says that 20%-25% of the students enter the accelerated graduate program, and 75% of those in the baccalaureate program say they eventually plan to get a graduate degree.

"That's exactly what we need," she says.