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AACN News Watch Weekly Edition

Published October 26, 2022

AACN Weekly News Watch
October 26, 2022
 
AACN Rounds with Leadership - Cynthia McCurren and Deborah TrautmanRounds with Leadership: 
Turning 10: Celebrating the Graduate Nursing Student Academy
 
In October 2012, AACN officially launched the Graduate Nursing Student Academy (GNSA) at its Fall Semiannual Meeting – now the Academic Nursing Leadership Conference – in Washington, DC. Though AACN had enjoyed a long history of providing services and guidance to students attending member schools, the Board of Directors realized that something more structured was needed to meet the professional development needs of graduate nursing students who were poised to assume leadership roles in the profession as faculty, researchers, administrators, and expert clinicians.
 
From its inception, the GNSA has provided opportunities for graduate students to learn, network, and lead. Membership, which has always been free, offers a wide variety of programs and resources, including webinars, a customized career center, an online collaboration community, a monthly newsletter, and opportunities to lead. Based on feedback from students, a strong focus throughout GNSA programming continues to be leadership development, career pathways, APRN role exploration, securing research funding, grant writing, publishing, and succeeding in teaching positions. 
 
 
Weekly Digest
In the November-December 2022 Journal of Professional Nursing, Dr. Kelly Powers from the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and colleagues published a new article on Faculty Perceptions of the Impact of the COVID-19 Pandemic on New Graduate Nurses' Transition to Practice: A Qualitative Study. This study explores the perceived impact of the pandemic on the practice readiness of new nurses and recommendations for promoting an effective transition to practice. Due to less hands-on learning, pandemic graduates may benefit from more time with preceptors and opportunities to focus on clinical reasoning, managing multiple patients, effective communication, and safe skill performance. 

In the October 20, 2022 issue of Inside Higher Ed, Colleen Flaherty reports on newly published data from the National Science Foundation’s annual Survey of Earned Doctorates in an article titled Ph.D.s Conferred Drop 5.4%. For the second consecutive year, the number of PhDs awarded across disciplines has declined, including a steep drop in 2021, the first full year of the pandemic. In data reported previously by AACN, the decline in PhDs conferred by nursing programs followed a similar trend with a 5.5% and 3.6% decrease in program graduates in 2020 and 2021, respectively.

AACN Updates
 
 
 

The Essential Update: The Latest on AACN's New Essentials
 
New Essentials Teaching Resource Database Launched 

AACN has launched a newly redesigned webpage to better showcase the resources and information available to help schools implement the 2021 Essentials. An important new feature of the site is a searchable teaching resource database containing learning strategies, recommended content, and assessment options that you can consider using as you adapt your programs. You can now search for this content by Domain, competency, and sub-competency, which will help you find the right resource to meet your curricular needs. This database will be continuously updated as new resources are added. Faculty are encouraged to submit their own resources that have been helpful in the move to the new competency expectations. Resources may be submitted for peer review using an online form. All those submitting content will be recognized for their contributions.
 

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Building Vaccine Confidence Campaign Spotlight
To increase vaccine confidence among nursing students and overcome vaccine hesitance in at-risk populations, AACN launched the Building COVID-19 Vaccine Confidence Among Nurses and in Communities in spring 2022. As part of this project, AACN awarded funding from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to 10 schools of nursing nationwide to launch targeted campaigns to build confidence in the COVID-19 vaccines and dispel health misinformation. For the next 10 weeks, AACN will spotlight each school’s efforts, including curriculum resources developed and a project overview video produced by AACN-TV.
Fayetteville State University Boosts Vaccine Confidence in
Diverse Communities
 
Fayetteville State University project leaders created an online course with learning modules created to empower and boost confidence among students and nurses. The course content focused on communication strategies to equip nursing students with sound knowledge and concise and factual verbiage to promote the vaccine, as well as case studies and simulation activities to help students prepare for engaging with the school’s diverse campus and community. To provide opportunities for students to engage in conversations regarding vaccine hesitancy, the nursing school used their mobile recreational vehicle unit at town hall events on campus to share credible COVID-19 vaccine information and resource materials and foster conversations to address vaccine misinformation. In addition, the school partnered with the Southern Regional Area Health Education Center to provide continuing education using an online self-paced course for nurses titled Empowering Nursing Students and Nurses to Build Healthier Communities.
 
Visit the AACN website to learn more about Fayetteville State University's campaign success and ways your school can adapt these efforts to boost vaccine confidence in your community. 

The Social Pulse
For the fourth year, Skyfactor Benchworks is awarding their Assessment and Impact Awards for Nursing Education to recognize and celebrate nursing schools' innovative ways of creating positive education experiences within their programs. This year’s awardees focused on retaining students and developing more practice-ready nursing professionals by fostering connections between students and faculty, using technology to stay in touch with students, integrating active learning, and more. Read the press release to learn more about this year's recipients: Dominican University New York, King University, and Thomas Jefferson University. 
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Campaign for Action is funding efforts to eliminate structural racism and other structural inequities within the nursing profession that lead to improved access to care for those disproportionally impacted by health disparities. Awards of up to $50,000 will be given. Applications are due November 15, 2022. Visit the website for application details, and retweet this tweet to spread the word on social media.
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Washington Weekly
Inside this edition of Washington Weekly:
  • 2022 Academic Nursing Leadership Conference: AACN’s Advocacy and Policy Recap
  • Looking Ahead: Registration for AACN’s 2023 Student Policy Summit is Now Open
Washington Weekly

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