Friday, April 4, 2025
4/4/2025
Community Project Funding/Congressionally Directed Spending - Construction - Community Project Funding/Congressionally Directed Spending - Construction - Trustees of St. Joseph’s College www.sjcme.edu $810,000 CDS Request PROJECT SUMMARY The Congressional Directed Spending grant of $810,000 will complete the funding for the Simulated Hospital and Home Health Floor that is Phase 1 of the final two construction phases of the Center for Nursing Innovation (CNI). The CNI is a larger project that also includes nursing scholarships for first-generation Maine nursing students and the development of new graduate nursing programs focused on gerontology. CDS funding will help underwrite the costs of renovating a floor of a current building to provide simulation labs and maintain essential safe skills practice for the College’s 250 Nursing students (+50% from ME) and 176 NP students (25% from ME). NEEDS TO BE ADDRESSED BY THE PROJECT The CDS-supported renovation project addresses the following problems in Maine: Critical Nursing Shortage—Nationally--by 2022, 700,000 nurses will retire; in Maine—43% of the workforce has reached retirement and approximately 3,500 additional nurses are needed right now. Aging population—21% of the population is 65 or older--the U.S. Census Bureau estimates that over 31% of Maine’s population will be 60 and older by 2030, an increase of 41% from 2012. Workforce shortages in nursing and home health care directly affect this population. Declining On-Site Clinical Learning Opportunities for Nursing Students—reduced patient stays and fewer clinical nurse supervisors mean fewer real-life training experiences. Lack of Sufficient Numbers of and Funding for Simulated Practice Labs—fewer clinical sites mean that educational programs must provide the next best thing—SIM labs that ensure students are learning safe hands-on practice—but they are expensive and infrastructure funding is often difficult to find. FACILITIES CREATED BY THE PHASE 1 RENOVATION Phase I—the Simulated Hospit al and Home Health Floor—will include 4 high-tech simulated hospital rooms (2 ICU, 1 pediatric, 1 maternity) with companion spaces for control and debriefing, a Community Home Health SIM “apartment,†a fundamental skills room, and a health assessment room. In addition will be a simulated Nurse Control desk, medical equipment and medication rooms. All instructional spaces will have Smart technology allowing real-time, remote learning as well as training in tele-health. CDS support of this project will serve primarily the 250 BSN students, 176 NP students, and 13 faculty in Saint Joseph’s Nursing Department—all of whom are sharing one lower-tech SIM lab currently. In addition, it will provide the technology and the space needed to begin broadening the College’s educational offerings to prepare students and aspiring home health workers to care for Maine’s elderly population, which is proportionately the largest in the nation.
HHS’ Tracking Accountability in Government Grants System (TAGGS) website provides access to detailed descriptions of grants, loans, aggregated direct payments and other types of financial assistance awarded by the HHS Operating Divisions (OPDIVs) and the Office of the Secretary Staff Divisions (STAFFDIVs).