CSUN Nursing received a grant from the Song-Brown Registered Nurse Education Program. The $240,000, two-year grant will help increase the diversity of California's healthcare workforce. For 20 years, CSUN Nursing has been committed to addressing health disparities and reaching out to students from traditionally underserved communities.
The grant will allow greater student support to help ensure academic and professional success and leadership. CSUN Nursing actively builds diversity among students so they reflect the community. As these students enter and progress in the workforce, cultural competence comes naturally. Knowing your patients, your colleagues and understanding differences is integral to effectively addressing health disparities in the community.
Samira Moughrabi is Nursing Faculty and Principal Investigator on the grant. “We’re committed to teaching cultural awareness and receptivity to differences,” Moughrabi said. “When cultural competence is part of the curriculum, stress is reduced in all areas—from professional relationships with colleagues to clinical experiences with patients. And the ultimate benefit is to our communities.”
Community engagement projects are vital to skill development, too. CSUN Nursing students participate in projects that reach out to the neediest members of our communities, such as people in homeless shelters or patients at community clinics in underserved areas.
These projects help raise student awareness of the issues facing our underserved communities and inspire further action. “We provide a curricular foundation for these projects and our students’ future careers with abundant class time and learning resources focused on health disparities, which helps to further broaden our students’ understanding of health needs in underserved areas and the roles they can play in addressing those needs,” Moughrabi said.
The Song-Brown grant will help support these community engagement activities and more. “With this initiative we can expand our Nursing advisory board, increase peer mentoring for students, award student stipends for our neediest students, and provide greater support for students preparing to take the NCLEX exam, which is required for licensure,” Moughrabi said.
This support also helps CSUN Nursing reach out to community colleges to connect with students in Registered Nurse (RN) programs to encourage them to pursue the Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) degree. “There is still a shortage of nurses in southern California, though we are closing the gap,” said Moughrabi.
The Song-Brown program mirrors the College’s CAMINO and the University’s BUILD PODER programs in the way it will engage and support diversity among students in the allied health fields and provide mentorship and advisement all along the way.
Under the Song-Brown Health Care Workforce Training Act, the California Healthcare Workforce Policy Commission solicits applications from programs that educate health professionals. Song-Brown priorities include increasing the racial and ethnic diversity of California’s healthcare workforce and addressing social determinants of health.
Jean O'Sullivan
SU2015