UTHealth program: Fast track to train Nursing faculty

From Medical News Today: http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/202993.php

Ten pacesetting doctoral students are on their way to earning their Ph.D. in Nursing in an innovative three-year pilot program at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth) School of Nursing. Each of the 10 students has agreed to provide at least three years of service as faculty members at a nursing school in the Texas Gulf Coast region after graduation.

Philanthropic support is providing each student with stipends that should enable them to get their degrees much sooner in a new accelerated Ph.D. program than the eight years of part-time study it traditionally takes to complete the rigorous doctoral curriculum of 66 post-master's credits.

"We turn away more than 9,000 qualified prospective nursing students annually in Texas, because there are not enough nursing faculty members to teach these students," said Patricia L. Starck, D.S.N., R.N., UTHealth School of Nursing's dean. "The bottleneck to balancing supply and demand for nurses is a shortage of nursing faculty - and we hope we're creating a national model for addressing this problem."

Spurred by a $500,000 challenge grant from The George Foundation of Fort Bend County, a successful $2-million fundraising effort was directed by the school's development office with leadership by members of the School of Nursing Advisory Council, chaired by George R. Farris. The initiative was conceived as a tribute to Starck's 25 years of service as dean of the nursing school and has been named in her honor: "The Patricia L. Starck Accelerated Ph.D. Scholars Program."

Each doctoral scholar carries the title of an organization that made a gift to the AccPhD initiative of at least $60,000 per year for the three years.

Source:
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston