The purpose of the Louisiana State University Health Sciences Center (LSUHSC), School of Nursing’s (SON) proposal for the program entitled Educating a Transitioning Nursing Workforce for Health Equity in Rural and Underserved Areas: Building a Clinical Nurse Educator Academy for Region 6 is to establish a clinical nurse educator (CNE) academy for Health and Human Services (HHS) region 6 (Louisiana, Oklahoma, Texas, Arkansas, and New Mexico); and to increase the registered nurse (RN) and advanced practice RN (APRN) nursing workforce as skilled and qualified academic clinical faculty and/or clinical preceptors focused on the development and support of nursing students and transitioning nurses into new practice within rural and underserved areas across HHS region 6. This project would be beneficial to the nursing workforce, particularly nursing faculty, and health needs of rural or medically underserved areas (MUAs) in the region. The project aims to expand academic practice partnerships (APPs) within rural and underserved areas for the CNE Academy and increase clinical nurse educators to serve as clinical faculty or clinical preceptors for the region. The CNE Academy will serve the region by centralizing partnerships focused on the recruitment, education, and retention of CNEs for RN and APRN programs; formally educating a diverse nursing workforce for clinical teaching of a diverse group of learners who care for patients from rural or MUAs. Aligned with national standards, the CNE Academy educational program will be competency-based with a focus on developing inclusive teaching and learning strategies, health equity, and resilience skills. Project Goal 1. Increase the nursing workforce by recruiting, training, and producing skilled qualified clinical nursing faculty and preceptors, by: Objective 1. Increasing the number of academic practice partnerships (APPs) to create a network of entities that can enable the recruitment and education of a dive
rse group of CNEs within the rural or MUAs of HHS region 6; Objective 2. Developing a CNE Academy for HHS region 6; and Objective 3. Increasing the number of clinical nursing educators within rural or MUAs (retention). Project Goal 2. Prepare nurses to serve as clinical nursing faculty and preceptors to newly hired or transitioning licensed nurses in a variety of care settings in rural or underserved areas, by: Objective 1. Increasing the knowledge and skills of RN and APRN CNEs to support the development of students and nurses transitioning into the nursing workforce. The project will be accomplished with licensed nurses across the region. Academy faculty will complete approximately 40 hours of professional development and earn Certified Nurse Educator – clinical education in preparation for developing the curriculum in collaboration with nursing education experts. Academy faculty will facilitate approximately 13 nursing continuing professional development (NCPD) credits for asynchronous and live learning experiences. Hired Academy staff will support and expand APPs and will support Academy participants to accomplish grant activities. Key APPs with national and Louisiana professional nursing organizations will be leveraged to expand partnerships across the region. Program evaluation will include monitoring of Academy participant progress, the development and implementation of APPs, and development and implementation of educational programming. Academy participants who commit to serving as a CNE with a SON or clinical agency will be tracked to evaluate their support of nurses transitioning to practice. Statutory funding preference is requested as this project will substantially benefit underserved populations.