100 Percent Pass Rate in Nursing Program
By: Margo Mead
Editor-in-Chief
Published January 23, 2019
Green River College offers two nursing programs, the Nursing Assistant Certification (NAC) and the License Practical Nursing (PN) program, as well as a Phlebotomy program, which started up last fall.
The NAC is a one-quarter program at wGreen River. Nursing Assistants are the people who “help with what we call ‘activities of daily living’, it’s the things that you and I do by ourselves that these patients might need a little bit of help with,” said Kara LaValley, the director of nursing programs at Green River.
Students in the program train and prepare in Green River’s nursing lab, and during the last few weeks of the quarter, go through 48 hours of work in a nursing home to practice their knowledge.
Many nursing assistants are pre-nursing, as the certification gives the ground foundation for future nursing programs. These programs prefer their students to have worked in health care prior to the program, meaning most of the nursing assistants are pre-nursing.
The other nursing program offered at Green River is the PN program, referred to as the practical nursing program since “you don’t get the L until you graduate and you get your license,” said LaValley. The practical nursing program is a one year program that goes from September to August.
The practical nursing program gives students a foundation for nursing that they may apply elsewhere after graduating. “LPMs work in hospitals, some work in nursing homes, but our traditional program gives them exposure to everything that they would need to be successful to go out and practice as a practical nurse,” said LaValley.
Starting in the first quarter, students experience different situations as they travel to clinical sites so they can apply what they learned in the classroom to the actual patient population. These various exposures include pediatrics, mother and baby, and medical-surgical.
For the first few quarters, a group of eight students works one on one with a nursing instructor to get a grasp on what they are doing. Then, towards the end of the program, they go through preceptorships, where it is just the student and the nurse. The student is figuring out what their role is as they take on more responsibility.
Another program offered at Green River alongside these nursing programs is the Phlebotomy program. “We just started that program in fall, and it’s been doing really well. Both classes have been full,” said LaValley. “We just graduated our first cohort in December and they did really, really well. We’re excited for them to go out and get jobs now.
A phlebotomist deals with blood and blood draws. Students in the class learn how to draw blood and run labs, as well as what is and is not normal in a test in order to alert others when necessary. Phlebotomists used to be trained in a hospital, clinic, or lab setting, but most moved into the college setting. Green River College trains students in the program in more than just phlebotomy: “we train them on things that can help them get a job elsewhere,” said LaValley.
Students in the phlebotomy program are also trained in how to check vital signs and on how to do an EKG. Students are trained on how to do these in case they want to work in an emergency room in the future and having this training prior gives them a “leg up in the competition,” said Lavalley.
Green River PN shows to be a strong program as the last class that graduated from the program had a 100 percent pass rate on their National Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX-PN), which is the state board test for nursing which Green River is held accountable. LaValley stated that the program is proud of this, as well as the programs recent pre-accreditation, which is the programs national certification, which they received in October.
There is a now an initiative in Washington State that all nursing programs in the state need to be accredited 2020. Since the nursing program has been a part of the Green River for over four years, LaValley states that they are “pre-accredited.” She also stated that the program was excited that they had gotten approved for accreditation, essentially right away.
“The next step is a big self-study where the entire nursing faculty has to take these different components of the Accreditation and write a big 200-page report,” said LaValley. “They then come out and survey the site and interview the staff, students, and faculty.” Green River’s nursing program has been approved by the state since it started, but now it is working to get that last national certification.
The nursing program is also working on a grant, “creating a pathway for students who have their medical assistance license to get their LPN,” said LaValley. The program will be submitting that grant in the spring, hoping to fund a group of medical assistant students in the fall of 2019.
Other options are available for those who are in need of funding who are interested in the program, as most nursing students qualify for some sort of funding or financial aid due to the nature of their job as a public servant. Public servant loan forgiveness is also an option. Working in public services means that “you can get your loans forgiven after you’ve made so many payments,” said LaValley
As for plans to create future programs, LaValley states that they “did have a proposal for a bachelor in nursing science, and we’re going back to the table but we probably won’t even be looking at that until 2020 or 2022 at the earliest.” This is due to the steps that the program needs to go through with the state board—needing everyone’s buy-in—in the community as well as all the other nursing schools.
Students who are interested in any of the three programs can go to Green River’s Career and Advising to talk to the health occupations advisor as they have the best knowledge on both the nursing and other health programs.
