Mar 28, 2024  
2022-2023 Catalog 
    
2022-2023 Catalog [ARCHIVED CATALOG]

Nursing Department


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The Nursing Department is committed to creating a local nursing workforce for the 21st century, informed by the Institute of Medicine Report on the Future of Nursing (2010); the Washington Center for Nursing Master Plan for Nursing Education (2008) and the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching, Educating Nurses: A Call for Radical Transformation, (Benner, Sutphen, Leonard, & Day, 2009).  These reports highlight how nurses’ roles, responsibilities, and education should change significantly to meet the increased demand for high-quality and high-value care, as well as to advance improvements in America’s increasingly complex health system.    

The Nursing Department is responsive to the current and evolving health care landscape. As we look to the future, our goal is to prepare nurses to make an enduring difference in the health of their families and communities in a highly complex environment; and to share accountability for collaborative decisions with members of interdisciplinary health teams. 

The Nursing Department is committed to preparing highly qualified nurse leaders to serve multicultural populations. The Nursing Department embraces the values of the University: “Honoring each person’s human dignity and potential; seeking intellectual growth and challenges; and celebrating the shared spiritual roots of all humankind.” The Nursing Department also endorses the core values of caring, connectivism, autonomy, integrity, and social justice.

The Baccalaureate degree in Nursing is a strong fit with Heritage University’s mission to “provide quality, accessible baccalaureate and master’s degrees to populations that, for reasons of location, poverty, or cultural background, have been denied these opportunities in the past.”  

The outcomes of the proposed Bachelor of Science in Nursing (BSN) program are congruent with the Heritage mission to offer strong professional career-oriented programs designed to enrich the quality of life for graduates and their communities. The Nursing Program Goals and Outcomes were derived directly from the Heritage University Student Learning Outcomes; and therefore fulfill the mission of Heritage University. While unique to Heritage, the BSN Program Outcomes are congruent with the American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) Essentials of Baccalaureate Education for Professional Nursing Practice (2008)

Nursing Program Goals and Outcomes

The Heritage baccalaureate nursing degree will prepare the graduate to function competently as: 

  1. Provider of Care – The Heritage baccalaureate nurse is prepared to assume accountability for the design and delivery of safe, holistic nursing; plans, implements, and evaluates nursing interventions from an ecological perspective for the individual, family, and community as the units of care. The Heritage baccalaureate nurse practices the art of nursing by integrating aesthetic knowing in nursing care.

  2. Scholar – The Heritage baccalaureate nurse explains how nursing’s fundamental patterns of knowing –personal, aesthetic, ethical, empirical and emancipatory –contribute to understanding the complexity of nursing care in the treatment of human response; and approaches nursing with a spirit of inquiry for understanding and application of nursing theories that explain and predict the outcomes of care.

  3. Leader and Collaborator – The Heritage baccalaureate nurse works collaboratively as a member of the interdisciplinary health care team; utilizes effective written and oral communication and professional behaviors to foster shared decision-making and accountability among team members to optimize outcomes of care; and integrates technological and mathematical knowledge to create a culture of quality and safety to prevent systems errors.  The Heritage baccalaureate nurse demonstrates courage and resilience from practicing self-care as requisite for creating a culture of safe and effective

  4. Member of the Profession – The Heritage baccalaureate nurse embodies professional values and responsibilities defined by the standards and scope of practice for the registered professional nurse; the American Nurses Association (ANA) Standards of Professional Nursing Practice; and Code of Ethics with Interpretive Statements. The Heritage baccalaureate nurse demonstrates caring ethical comportment; expresses passion for sustainability and justice; participates in the policy processes impacting the health of individuals, families, communities and populations; and works to increase access to care, especially for vulnerable populations and to overcome social determinants of health inequities. The graduate also will assume accountability for maintaining professional practice through self-reflection; and demonstrate continuous professional engagement and lifelong learning.

 

Degrees and Programs Offered

The Nursing Department offers courses to complete the following degrees:

Programs

    Bachelor of Science

    Courses

      Nursing

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