AACN News Watch Weekly Edition

Rounds with Leadership: Charting the Future of Academic Nursing – Part I

At the culmination of National Nurses Week on May 11, the National Academy of Medicine released the long-awaited report on The Future of Nursing 2020-2030, which provides a blueprint for how nurses can address pervasive health inequities and serve as catalysts for change. The predominant theme threaded throughout the report is that the US cannot achieve the goal of ensuring health equity without strengthening nursing capacity and expertise. This new call to action includes practical steps that all nurses, faculty, and students can take to advance the profession’s priorities related to achieving social justice, advocating for sound public policy, and enhancing the quality of care available to all.

We were particularly pleased to see alignment between the report’s call for transformation and AACN’s strategic priorities, including synergy with The Essentials: Core Competencies for Professional Nursing Education. Endorsed by the AACN membership on April 6, the new Essentials outline competency expectations for preparing all new nurses to address the social determinants of health at both the individual and systems level, a key recommendation in the Future of Nursing report. AACN’s work to advance a competency-based approach to education, promote excellence in public health and population health, champion a robust nursing research agenda, and create inclusive learning environments are all consistent with the report’s goals. The association is well-positioned to lead efforts to meet other key objectives, which include expanding clinical learning experiences into community settings, promoting nurse wellness and resilience, stimulating nurse leadership development, and facilitating efforts to recruit diverse faculty and students into the nursing profession.

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