Our Mission & Goals

Mission

The mission of the College of Nursing and Health Sciences is to educate health professionals who promote behaviors and practices to achieve optimal health, deliver safe, quality care, and assume leadership roles in their respective disciplines. The College aims to promote innovation in clinical practice, programs and technology through undergraduate and graduate teaching excellence, research and service.

Goals

Research

• Develop an infrastructure to support and mentor faculty in the area of research
  • Create a process in which junior faculty with a research focus or research agenda are able to be mentored by senior faculty internally and/or in other areas of the university related to preparing research proposals and grants.
  • Provide research-focused seminars and training on a minimum of an annual basis to faculty interested in conducting research.
• Develop interdisciplinary research initiatives within and outside of the college to foster a culture of collaboration on healthcare initiatives and research.
  • Identify "healthcare communities of interest" in which interdisciplinary research would be successful.

Faculty

• Provide opportunities each semester for faculty training in pedagogical and instructional techniques and technologies
  • Create a Faculty Forum Program to provide development opportunities, which would include 4-6 sessions per semester related to targeted areas of faculty development (i.e. clinical evaluation, test construction, classroom management)
  • Amend the College bylaws to create a Faculty Development Committee for the College of Nursing and Health Sciences
• Convene faculty and student representatives from each of the academic programs within the college to develop a plan to integrate cross-disciplinary course offerings in all curricula in the college. 

Governance

• Provide faculty, staff, and administrators in the college access to data analytics that include a wide array of transparent performance metrics to monitor, analyze, and report trends related to:.
  • Acceptance Rates:
    • Monitor and report percentage of students accepted into undergraduate nursing clinical (each semester).
  • Articulation:
    • Increase rate of eligible RN to BSN students accepted into the college’s graduate nursing program annually.
  • Certification Rates:
    • Monitor and report pass rates on various certification examinations. Benchmark for Nursing, Health Information Management, and Dietetics  (95% and above)
  • Job Placement/Employer Satisfaction/Enrollment in Graduate Programs:
    • Monitor and report percentage of graduates who obtain employment within 6 months of graduation among all Nursing and Allied Health graduates.
  • Student Satisfaction:
    • Increase participation in surveys regarding satisfaction with educational preparation for his or her career.
    • Monitor and report college’s overall performance on SEIs and through focus groups, BSN and Allied Health Dean’s Advisory Councils, EBIs, etc.  Instructor performance should consistently remain at or above university averages.
  • Faculty Retention:
    • Monitor and report full-time faculty retention rates (including retirement, resignation, and termination) which should remain at or above 90% annually
  • Student Retention:
    • Monitor and report first-time freshman to second semester freshmen progression rates.
    • Monitor and report graduation rates for all programs.

Students

• Establish a mechanism of research mentoring to engage undergraduate and graduate students and increase student productivity in research.
• Establish a program of co-curricular activities to enhance student engagement, community involvement and the educational experience
  • Provide seminars at least annually to foster involvement in professional activities and to provide opportunities for faculty/student engagement outside of classroom.
  • Develop a global experience opportunity, to take place at least every two years, for students and faculty interested in multicultural  engagement (examples: study abroad, medical mission trip, service projects)