Photo courtesy of Valley Initiative for Development and Advancement	More NurseWeek Features   Smoke-Free Zone   Nurses and patients tackle nicotine addiction   Bloodless Survival     Surgical techniques to use when transfusion drops out of the equation
The Valley Initiative for Development and Advancement has piqued the interest of the U.S. Department of Labor as a possible national model with its groundbreaking program to provide nurse training in the heavily Hispanic Rio Grande Valley area of South Texas. Here, VIDA students Monica Elizondo, Lydia Lara and Jennifer Watkins participate in an exercise that involves role playing.

As some nurse recruiters scour the world to fill chronically empty hospital jobs, others are looking to another place for help: their own city's urban neighborhoods.

American minorities, still largely underrepresented as caregivers in hospitals, may be the key to the industry's crippling labor shortage, say organizers of new programs that encourage inner-city nurse training.

One such group, the Valley Initiative for Development and Advancement, has even piqued the interest of the U.S. Department of Labor as a possible national model with its groundbreaking program in the heavily Hispanic Rio Grande Valley area of South Texas.

VIDA launched the Rio Grande Valley Allied Health Training Alliance early last year as a pilot program for 40 students.

"In a year and a half, we placed 180 [nurses] through it and it looks like we will place a total of about 400 by the end of 2004," said Dominique Halaby, VIDA's executive director. Most graduate as RNs and take positions in area hospitals, helping fill bilingual job requirements while offering culturally sensitive care.

Using seed money from the city of McAllen, the Weslaco-based organization teamed with the area's workforce board and several schools, hospitals and charitable organizations to form the alliance. Its main focus is to help college-age Hispanics overcome such daunting obstacles as tuition and book costs, but also some less tangible roadblocks such as child care and transportation needs.

In early September, the labor department flew Halaby to Washington for a briefing on the program and, two weeks later, department representatives traveled to the Valley, part of a poverty-stricken area of 1.1 million that includes McAllen, Edinburg, Mission, Browns-ville and Harlingen.

"We're here to see how this collaboration works and determine if it can be a model for similar opportunities in other parts of the country," said Joe Juarez, regional administrator for the labor department's Region 4, as he toured the area Sept. 15.

"It has the three key ingredients we feel this type of program needs to succeed: employer involvement, community involvement and the participation of educational institutions," he said. "How many times do we hear that the education community is too slow to react, and that there are too many barriers to certification? Well, they are working out those issues here."

Participating students who have completed at least one semester of college are interviewed by VIDA counselors for the program. When they are accepted, counselors will help students outline a path to a nursing degree at one of three area colleges: South Texas Community College, Texas State Technical College and the University of Texas at Brownsville.

As they begin their studies, students will be placed in a health-related job at one of the many hospitals participating in the program, making at least $7 per hour for a maximum 10 to 20 hours per week. Each participant has a case manager/facilitator to help students overcome behaviors or problems that might impede their progress, Halaby said.

All 14 Valley-area hospitals have opted to participate. Brownsville's Valley Regional Medical Center has sent recruiting teams as far away as England, South Africa and the Philippines in search of nurse recruits, according to Charles Sexton, chief executive officer for the hospital.

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