The Cal State Long Beach School of Nursing received a $170,000 grant last week because of its contributions to areas with nursing shortages.
The Office of Statewide Health Planning and Development (OSHPD) awarded grants via the Song-Brown Program to 12 universities across California.
Out of the $1.74 million handed out in total, CSULB and the University of Southern California received the largest sums, at $170,000 each.
“The School of Nursing is very thankful to the OSHPD for awarding us the money,” said Nursing Department Chair Lucy Huckabay. “We will use this fund to supplement the number of nursing faculty to supervise our family nurse practitioner students in the clinical settings.”
Without the grant, the School of Nursing would have had to make major cuts to its Family Nurse Practitioner Program (FNP).
“About 70 percent of the money is going to be used to hire the additional faculty that we need that the general university budget does not provide,” Huckabay said. “Without this money, we would probably reduce our FNP enrollments by 50 percent.”
The California Healthcare Workforce Policy Commission, which works with OHSPD to administer the grants, recognized CSULB as a leading contributor to OHSPD’s priorities. Those priorities include increasing nursing graduates, increasing access to healthcare and increasing clinical training in areas with shortages of registered nurses.
“We are producing FNPs, who will be caring for patients and families in under-served areas,” Huckabay said. “Over 67 percent of our graduates work and care for patients in underserved communities after graduation.”
Information officer David Byrnes said that the commission acknowledged CSULB’s effort to apply the goals of the Song-Brown Program.
“The awarded funds will allow CSULB to continue in its efforts to produce quality, culturally competent nursing graduates providing care in California,” Byrnes said.
The School of Nursing is currently training around 200 FNP students. About half of those students spend their time in the classroom taking required courses.
The other half of students study in clinical settings, training in groups of 12 to 15 with one faculty member in locations across Southern California. These students are most affected by the grant.
The goal of the Song-Brown program is to educate nursing students by providing funds to registered nurse education programs. Established in 1973, it expanded in 1978 to include FNPs and again in 2005 to include registered nurses. The CSULB School of Nursing has received Song-Brown grants in the past and last year received $290,000 from OSHPD.