New College to Supply Nurses for Cedar City with Innovative Education Model and Local Partnerships

CEDAR CITY, Utah - Oct. 10, 2017 - PRLog -- Nightingale College, a blended-distance nursing school, partners with health care facilities in Iron County to provide nursing education opportunities within Cedar City.

"We are excited to be entering into the Cedar City area. We know that the health of the community will be greatly improved by an increased number of registered nurses," said Jonathan Tanner, Vice President, Partnerships and Business Development at Nightingale.

Nightingale College, based out of Ogden, Utah, employs a hybrid model which allows students to complete all their didactic work online, and their clinicals within a local facilites. This increases the number of students that the College can enroll in the programs at one time, because class capacity is not limited by the size of a building. Instead, the College expands by hiring local faculty and utilizing partner facilities in the area. Nightingale College has no waitlists for their programs, so qualified applicants from Cedar City can start immediately.

The College has other partnership locations, termed "Dedicated Distance Cohorts" or DDCs, located throughout Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming, and is continuing to grow. Some DDC locations include a lab, which high-fidelity mannequins are used to teach students essential nursing skills before entering the workplace.

Although Cedar City is home to Southern Utah University and an hour away from Dixie State University, nursing programs are still in demand and nursing college acceptance remains competitive, especially in rural communities. SUU doesn't offer an Associate Degree in Nursing, and Dixie State's program only accepts 40 a semester. With thriving Intermountain Hospitals in the area and an upward population trend in the Cedar City area, the demand for nurses and nursing education continues to rise.

This increasing demand for nurses in Cedar City is mirrored in almost every rural community in the United States; in fact, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reports a shortage of over a million nurses.  Partnerships like this allow for students in rural towns to become an RN without relocating, resulting in improved healthcare and an increased number of nurses in their communities.

Some of the things that make Cedar City unique are the small-town feel, the scenery, the community events, and its central location between Las Vegas and Salt Lake City. Nightingale is confident that this location will attract potential learners from a multitude of surrounding locations.

Nightingale College hopes that this opportunity will benefit both Cedar City and surrounding areas in accordance with the College's vision, "Better Health & Better Humanity for a Better World."

ABOUT NIGHTINGALE COLLEGE

Nightingale College (http://www.nightingale.edu/) creates avenues to accessible nursing programs with its fully accredited distance education associate and bachelor's degree nursing programs. Supporting the growing need for nurses and providing strategies to combat the nursing shortage, the College's programs work to not only grow but maintain homegrown nurses with the help of local health care systems. Nightingale College emphasizes graduating future nurses who are confident, competent, and compassionate, ready to work in their community. Since its establishment in 2010 in Ogden, Utah, the College has graduated nurses in Utah, Idaho, and Wyoming. To learn more about the College, its mission, and programs, visit http://nightingale.edu/.