May 25 , 2016 | Centers for Nursing Education

Colleagues, sadly, on May 13, the NLN lost a committed and valued member, Dr. Linda Howe. Linda served on the NLN Board of Governors and was a current member of the Nursing Education Perspectives Editorial Board. When she was inducted into the NLN Academy of Nursing Education in 2015, Mary Lou Sole, her dean at the University of Central Florida College of Nursing stated, “She made a lasting impression with her creativity in the classroom and dedication to students. Through her innovative teaching strategies and endowed scholarship, she will continue to touch lives and make a positive impact on nursing students at UCF and beyond. It was a privilege to work alongside Linda.” How true that is – we miss Linda’s warmth and her wonderful smile. Our condolences to her family and to her UCF colleagues.

Linda was member of the NLN Board of Governors during a particularly fruitful period of time, for that is when we moved to Washington DC and created seven Centers for Nursing Education. It’s amazing what we accomplished during her tenure – Linda completed her second term on the BOG in September 2014 – and it is mind-boggling to recount what we are doing now.

Usually when I write about the NLN Centers I do it one at a time. Today I’ll try to present highlights about the activities of the seven centers, recognizing that there will be omissions as we have so much going on and there is often overlap between groups. But here goes – wish me luck.

With our ongoing generous funding from Johnson & Johnson and additional support from Galen College School of Nursing, 2016 cohorts have been selected for the NLN Leadership Institute: LEAD, Leadership Development Program for Simulation Educators, and Executive Leadership in Nursing Education and Practice. Simulation educators are developing a plan for mentoring faculty who are new to simulation and a career trajectory plan. LEAD participants and executive leaders are working on their proposals for leadership projects.

Government affairs and public policy are also part of this center. As I mentioned in my last Member Update, we take an active role in supporting Title VII and Title VIII funding and recently added a virtual component for the 2016 Day on the Hill so that NLN members could participate. And we were thrilled that through the magic of social media, 90,000 of you joined in, tweeting, emailing, and posting messages on Facebook.

This center recently published and disseminated A Vision to Achieve Diversity and Meaningful Inclusion in Nursing Education and will soon publish the NLN Global Vision Statement. It has also worked with the Consortium of Universities on Global Health Subcommittee to develop a toolkit on global health competencies.

The center and NLN Testing Services have completed conversion of all tests to the QuestionMark platform, reaching out to testing customers to orient them to the new platform prior to testing, during testing, and following testing. It has developed a new multi-level Pre-Admission Exam (PAX), which went live on March 1.

The research branch of the center conducted the 2016 NLN Biennial Survey of Schools of Nursing and will complete analysis of the NLN Faculty Census Survey this summer. It consults with all of the NLN for the development of needed surveys.

At the NLN STTI Nursing Education Research Conference in April, the center released the NLN Vision for Advancing the Science of Nursing Education: The NLN Nursing Education Research Priorities (2016-2019). The conference served to open national dialogue on the role of the science of learning in nursing education. And speaking of research, our call for research proposals this year resulted in 40 submissions, including 12 dissertation projects, nearly doubling 2015 submissions. Research award recipients will be notified in early June and announced at the NLN Education Summit in September.

The transition for the publication of Nursing Education Perspectives is complete and three issues have already been distributed by Wolters Kluwer. Access to our research journal is a valuable membership benefit

The 2016 Scholarly Writing Retreat will be held at NLN headquarters in June and led by Dr. Marilyn Oermann. The response from applicants far exceeded the ability of this session to accommodate those qualified to attend. In other words, it is so popular and needed, only one retreat per year does not address the need.

ACE.D (Advancing Care Excellence for Persons with Disabilities) will be launched in summer 2016 through a partnership with Dr. Suzanne Smeltzer and Villanova University.

The first workshops for the Retirement Research Foundation grant in collaboration with the Paraprofessional Healthcare Institute (PHI) to disseminate the ACE.S (Advancing Care Excellence for Seniors) program and PHI’s Coaching-Supervision Core Skills to practical nursing programs throughout the United States took place in California and Newark, NJ. Upcoming workshops will take place in Orlando, FL (Summit 2016) and Corpus Christi, TX (October 2016).

To develop faculty guides for the vSim fundamentals, pharmacology, and gerontology series, more than 50 schools of nursing collected data on their use in a variety of classroom and clinical settings. Implementation guides will be released by the end of June. Another addition to the vSim portfolio will be vSim for Nursing: Assessment to be released in June. Look for an announcement about this series for beginning students.

The Vision Statements for Teaching with Simulation and Debriefing Across the Curriculum have generated new faculty development initiatives by the NLN. The NLN, in collaboration with the University of Maryland School of Nursing, will conduct a second Institute for Simulation Educators immersive hands-on workshop for 30 faculty at the end of July.

Earlier this week, the center launched the Technology Edge Quarterly (TEQ) (and don’t you just love the acronym?) to keep nurse educators up to date on technology-enhanced learning.

NLN Center for Academic and Clinical Transitions

Molly Kellgren, A2P project manager, has aligned A2P competencies with product resources (vSim and ApprenNet), developed scripts and evaluation rubrics for ApprenNet to strengthen graduate communication and leadership skills, and orchestrated the work of simulation experts to finalize expansion of NLN complex simulation scenarios to match with A2P competencies. A2P is moving rapidly forward with a planned soft launch at the Summit, adoption of pilot hospitals in the fall, and a full launch early in 2017.

Well, I got through my list, but I know I’ve forgotten something. That’s it – I forgot to mention that Drs. Elaine Tagliareni and Janice Brewington are the NLN chief program officers who oversee the seven centers. They do a remarkable job and, thank goodness, they are highly organized. There is a lot of overlap with all NLN projects and members and corporate and not-for-profit partners are involved.

I hope this overview gives you a taste of what life is like at the NLN. You will see lots of our work products on display at the NLN Education Summit in Orlando (September 21-23). Don't forget to register before May 31, when the most favorable rates come to an end.

There are a couple of other deadlines you need to know about.

First, May 31 is the deadline for the 2016 NLN Foundation Scholarship Awards of up $8000 to help complete graduate education. Colleagues, don't miss this important opportunity.

Second, it’s election season at the NLN. We are counting on you, as an NLN member, to demonstrate your commitment to influence the direction of the League and contribute to good governance. Voting is open until June 1 for Board of Governors secretary, two members of the Nominations Committee, two members of the Strategic Steering Committee, and two members of the NLN Certification Commission. Vote here by June 1.

We have issued a call for nomination for the 2016 NLN Awards with a deadline of July 24. This year we will present the NLN Mary Adelaide Nutting Award for Outstanding Teaching or Leadership in Nursing Education, the NLN Isabel Hampton Robb Award for Outstanding Leadership in Clinical Practice, and the NLN Lillian Wald Humanitarian Award. Help us locate the most deserving individuals for recognition. Please review the awards criteria and complete the official nomination form.

And finally, NLN President Anne Bavier and I (and six other nurses) are among the candidates nominated for Modern Healthcare’s 100 Most Influential People in Healthcare. Please cast you ballot by June 24. We feel strongly that a vote for nurses and nurse educators is important for the recognition of our profession. I thank you and I know our president thanks you for your support.

Next Issue of the NLN Member Update: Wednesday, June 8, 2016. View previous issues of NLN Member Update »