A Fresh Start
As a new year begins, nursing is poised to take advantage of encouraging trends

By Beth Ulrich, Ed.D, RN, South Central Editor
January 7, 2002

Like many people, I almost always start the New Year by cleaning up something-my desktop, a closet, the garage-anything that makes me feel as though I'm starting over. Although it's only a one-day difference in the calendar, the beginning of a new year is a kind of mental milestone. It is a time of reflecting on the events of the past year and planning the next. There is a feeling of rebirth when another year begins, and the urge is strong to change behaviors, reset priorities and start new projects.

Certainly, 2001 was a year of both positive and negative events in the nation and our four-state region. The World Trade Center and Pentagon attacks solidified a nation and instantly reset private and public priorities. The nursing shortage became big national news.

We ended the year on some positive notes that give us a good foundation for work to be done in 2002. The CNN/USA Today/Gallup poll showed the high respect the public has for nursing and the American Association of Colleges of Nursing report revealed an increase in enrollments in generic bachelor's programs from 2000 to 2001, reversing a six-year trend of declining enrollments in nursing.

The increase across the United States was 3.7 percent (13.2 percent in Arkansas, 0.3 percent in Louisiana, 2.5 percent in Oklahoma and 6.2 percent in Texas). Although the total number of students enrolled in these programs is still below the number in 1995 when the decline began, the halt of the downward trend is a good sign. Intensified and collaborative recruitment efforts, online programs and increased faculty funding from public and private sources all contributed to the increased enrollment and need to be continued and even expanded in 2002.

One of our goals that was achieved at the end of 2001 was the passage of the Nurse Reinvestment Act. The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives passed versions of the act (HR 3487 and SB 1864) in the final hours of the 2001 congressional session. Because the versions are different (the Senate bill provides more support), the bills now must go to a conference committee to resolve the differences. Until that occurs, the bills cannot move forward for the president's signature. With all that our legislators have before them, it will be important for us to make sure they understand the importance of finalizing the Nurse Reinvestment Act in 2002.

We start 2002 in an interesting position. In a perverse way, the nursing shortage is helping us. Rarely before, if ever, have so many people been so willing to listen to what needs to be done to recruit and retain nurses. Hospital CEOs and board members, state and national legislators, newspaper and television reporters are aware of the nursing shortage.

The events of Sept. 11 have significantly increased the positive coverage of service sector jobs like nursing, policing and firefighting. Layoffs and job eliminations in other professions have people looking enviously at professions such as ours-which offer virtually guaranteed work-as their first or second career choices. In addition, recent research indicates that many of the newest generation of young adults heading for college want to work in the service sector in jobs that allow them to give something back to their communities.

The opportunities for nursing and nurses have never been better. The big unknown is whether we in nursing have the courage to clean up our collective baggage of internal battles (or at least box them up and store them away for the short-term), move from griping about our problems to being a part of creating solutions and make improving nursing our No.1 priority in 2002. I think we can do it. Let me know what you think.

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