Gonzaga University says it plans to offer once again its own undergraduate nursing degree and ultimately to end its longtime relationship with the Washington State University Intercollegiate College of Nursing.


Mary Sue Gorski, chairwoman of Gonzagas nursing department, says that pending approval by the Washington state Nursing Care Quality Commission, the private Jesuit school will begin offering a four-year bachelors degree in nursing in the spring 2006 semester, which starts in January. Gonzaga already has some well-established nursing offerings, including its masters degree in nursing and its pre-nursing undergraduate coursework, that already have nursing commission approval, Gorski says.


The school hasnt begun accepting applications for its planned upper-division nursing courses yet, but expects to accept up to 24 students into the program for the spring 2006 semester. Thereafter, the school plans to take 24 students into the program each year.


Some Gonzaga students currently are enrolled in the WSU Intercollegiate College of Nursing, and once all of those students complete coursework two years from now, Gonzaga will end its relationship with ICN, leaving ICN with three participating schoolsWSU, Eastern Washington University, and Whitworth College, which also long have been part of the intercollegiate consortium.


While Gonzaga students no longer will be funneled into ICN, Gorski says the two schools will continue to look for ways to collaborate, though its unclear at this point what such collaborations might involve.


Gorski says Gonzagas biggest driver for offering its own nursing degree is a projected national nursing shortage during the next 10 years that will be pretty much unprecedented.


Many of Gonzagas pre-nursing students havent been able to get into ICN because of heavy demand for the 200 spots that open up at the ICN in Spokane annually. The ICN also has branch campuses elsewhere in the state, Gorski says.


Gonzaga had worked with Seattle Universitys nursing program over the last couple of years to secure more upper-division spots for its students, but even with that, some qualified Gonzaga students couldnt get into upper-division programs to earn their four-year degree.


Dorothy Detlor, dean of WSUs nursing college and ICN, says that because the ICN is only budgeted to take 200 new students here each year, it typically has to turn away about three-quarters of the 800-some qualified applicants.


Consequently, the school has had to turn away a large number of applicants from all of the schools that comprise the consortium, even though it reserves 80 percent of its openings for students from those schools, Detlor says.


Even with ICNs plans to build a state-of-the-art $34.6 million nursing school building here, which is in design and is scheduled to be constructed in time for the 2008-2009 school year, ICN wont be able to increase enrollment enough to meet the needs of all applicants from Spokane, Detlor says.


Gonzaga concluded that this was their best bet, and I support that, Detlor says.


Detlor says her only concern about Gonzaga splitting away from ICN is tightness in clinical placements for students, which can be hard to secure, but she adds that the schools will work together on that issue.


As part of proposed nursing offerings, Gonzaga and Holy Family Hospital have teamed up to form a learning resource center at the North Side medical center, Gorski says. She says such a learning center will include hospital equipment and mannequins on which Gonzaga students can practice various procedures with the equipment.


She says both students and Holy Family staff will be able to use the resource center to hone their skills.