Global Courant 2023-04-25 16:23:01
A leadership gap threatens to close a nursing program in Portland, Oregon, worrying students and faculty as the state grapples with a nurse shortage.
Portland Community College’s nursing program director has not been replaced since he stepped down last month, Oregon Public Broadcasting reported. The school has until May 4 to fill the vacancy per state nursing regulations.
Students and teachers say they are concerned.
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“We have students who are about to graduate,” said Anne Mortensen, a nursing faculty member at PCC. “They can’t graduate if we don’t have a principal.”
Dozens of people attended the college board meeting last week to testify and call for the director of the nursing program to be replaced.
Portland Community College’s nursing school faces closure as the program struggles to find a replacement for a principal who resigned last month.
PCC’s nursing school says part of the challenge of filling the leadership position has been financial. Two faculty members who offered to temporarily fill the position asked for higher pay. PCC declined the offer, OPB reported.
The college “is working to find a replacement quickly,” PCC’s interim senior director of marketing and communications James Hill said in a statement to OPB.
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A possible closure would likely exacerbate Oregon’s shortage of nurses and nursing staff.
Oregon nursing programs struggle to recruit teachers due to low wages. Nurses earn more in healthcare than in education. Oregon has the 12th largest pay gap in the country between nursing faculty and nurse specialists, according to a recent state agency report.
