New Grand Canyon University Program to Address Nursing Shortage

By Becky Pallack, The Arizona Daily Star, Tucson

Jan. 18–As the Arizona nursing shortage continues, Grand Canyon University is joining with the Hospital Council of Southern Arizona to offer a fast-track nursing degree program in Tucson.

Grand Canyon University, a private Christian college based in Phoenix, plans to enroll 60 to 90 students in the first year, said Fran Roberts, dean of the College of Nursing and Health Sciences. Local hospitals will sign up to sponsor the students, underwriting their tuition with the hopes of hiring them after graduation.

While the new 20-month program will help ease the shortage, Southern Arizona hospitals will need more than 2,400 new registered nurses by 2010, according to the Hospital Council. A traditional nursing program takes a student through four years of classes.

A formal announcement about the program will be made today at the Arizona Association for Economic Development forum on healthcare in Tucson. — Read more about it in tomorrow’s Arizona Daily Star.

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Copyright (c) 2007, The Arizona Daily Star, Tucson

Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Business News.

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