the FAST FACTS
Addressing the Nursing Shortage. Washington State, like the rest of the nation, is facing a severe nursing shortage. By 2006, registered nurse job growth is expected to climb 21 percent. By 2010, the baby boom retirement will create a crisis as demand for nurses outstrips the anticipated supply. The College’s strategic plan calls for increasing the number of entry level and advanced practice nurses by improving the delivery of education, especially to rural and underserved areas of the state, and increasing research excellence to attract faculty. The College also plans to add a doctoral program to address the region’s critical need for nursing faculty and the existing shortage of nurse scientists and nurse executives. A new facility is essential to meet existing student needs, to enroll additional students, to entice and retain new faculty, and to manage externally funded grants which enhance these efforts.
Quality and Quantity of Space A Critical Need. The Intercollegiate College of Nursing began seeking additional space for library and research facilities in 1992. The College sought 20,000 feet of new space in an addition to the 1980-built Magnuson Intercollegiate Nursing Building and renovation of the existing library space to provide essential distance learning classrooms for existing programs. WSU, in collaboration with the other members of the nursing consortium, has determined that re-location of the College to the Riverpoint campus will more effectively serve the stakeholders. The Riverpoint campus is close to the city’s major hospitals.
Facilitating Growth. Without a new modern facility, program growth is at a stand-still. This project will provide the library, archival, instructional, research, communications, and study space that is key to facilitating growth. A new facility is essential to faculty recruitment; expanding undergraduate/graduate programs; and providing sufficient classroom, faculty, and support staff space. It will accommodate a larger computer classroom/teaching laboratory; practice laboratory; and distance learning classrooms. In addition, it will support the proposed doctoral program and provide dedicated space for funded research. This proposal addresses these current and future needs by moving expanded library facilities into the Riverpoint Campus Library space in the Academic Center Building and building a new Intercollegiate Nursing Building at the Riverpoint Campus.
This new facility will keep WSU a leader in preparing nurses to meet the health care needs of Washington’s people. It will expand the knowledge base of health care practice, and enhance WSU’s strategic emphasis on biotechnology research by collaboration with other disciplines and institutions on the Riverpoint higher education campus.