UNT Health Science Center says it will launch a college of nursing. The school says it has started a nationwide search for a dean.
At a meeting of the UNT System Board of Regents, UNTHSC President Sylvia Trent-Adams said the school is now reviewing its programs to plan for future workforce needs.
"We need to continue to build those business relationships to understand what employers want us to produce as it relates to the healthcare workforce but also the scientific workforce," she said. "As we look at new programs, we need to be focused on not what we're doing right now or what we did yesterday but what does the future look like?"
Trent-Adams' background is in nursing. She says HSC leadership has launched a search for a dean for the college, and the school's leadership will start recruiting, developing courses and working on licensing.
Trent-Adams became UNTHSC president in September. At the meeting this month, she said HSC would look at its budget priorities this year.
"We want to look at how we spend our money and also have policies and procedures around the budget process," she said.
For the college of nursing, UNT Health Science Center at Fort Worth cites a Nurse Journal Study saying nurses make up the largest part of the healthcare workforce. HSC says Texas has the second fewest nurses per person in the country, and current schools turned away 30,000 applicants the past two years because of a lack of space.
“Texas is grappling with a significant nursing shortage,” Jack Frazee, director of Government Affairs and General Counsel for the Texas Nurses Association, wrote in a statement sent by HSC. “There is no better way to address this challenge than through education. Nurses are the bedrock of the health care system in the U.S. and around the world. The entire health care ecosystem will benefit from a new school of nursing.”
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