Nursing Workforce Development (NWD) - The Geisinger School of Nursing (GSON), a component of the Geisinger College of Health Sciences, requests $2,219,976 over four years through the HRSA Nursing Workforce Development (NWD) Program to increase educational opportunities and workforce entry among nursing students from disadvantaged backgrounds who will serve rural and medically vulnerable communities across central and northeastern Pennsylvania. Geisinger serves a large multi-county region characterized by extensive rural geography, numerous federally designated Health Professional Shortage Areas (HPSAs) and Medically Underserved Areas/Populations (MUA/Ps), persistent healthcare workforce shortages, and substantial socioeconomic disadvantage. Geisinger currently hires approximately 700 registered nurses annually and reports more than 700 RN vacancies across its service area. GSON serves as a critical regional workforce pipeline, enrolling students who predominantly originate from rural and underserved communities. Among currently enrolled students, 99.3% reside in rural counties, 75.7% come from economically disadvantaged communities, 42.4% are first-generation college students, and 55.5% meet at least one HRSA disadvantaged background criterion. The proposed project will implement the Geisinger Workforce Pipeline Model, a comprehensive, evidence-based framework designed to increase enrollment, retention, graduation, licensure attainment, and workforce entry among students from disadvantaged backgrounds. The model integrates six coordinated intervention domains: (1) recruitment and pipeline development; (2) financial assistance and emergency support; (3) academic success and early alert systems; (4) student engagement, wellness, and coordinated student support; (5) workforce readiness, NCLEX-RN success, and transition-to-practice support; and (6) faculty and preceptor development. Major activities include targeted recruitment and outreach; approximately 40 scholarships (10 annually) for students from disadvantaged backgrounds; emergency financial assistance; academic coaching, tutoring, and early-alert interventions utilizing ATI Launch and ATI Pulse analytics; faculty advising; wellness programming and coordinated Care Team services; NCLEX-RN preparation and career readiness programming; and faculty and preceptor development activities to strengthen clinical teaching and mentoring capacity. Project objectives are to: (1) increase enrollment, retention, progression, and graduation among students from disadvantaged backgrounds; (2) strengthen academic, financial, social, and workforce supports that promote student success and degree completion; and (3) strengthen faculty and preceptor capacity to support high-quality nursing education and clinical learning environments. Expected outcomes by the end of the four-year project period include maintaining enrollment of students from disadvantaged backgrounds above 40% annually; maintaining retention rates at or above 85%; increasing graduation rates from 70% to 75%; providing scholarships to 40 students; ensuring that at least 75% of participating students utilize support services annually; maintaining NCLEX-RN first-time pass rates of at least 93%; achieving employment rates of at least 90% within six months of graduation; and increasing the proportion of graduates employed in rural and medically underserved communities to at least 60%, thereby strengthening the regional nursing workforce pipeline and increasing the supply of practice-ready registered nurses prepared to serve Pennsylvania's rural and medically vulnerable communities.
