The New Mexico Nursing Education Consortium: Fostering Innovative Education to Promote Health Equity.

With shortfalls of thousands of nurses throughout the United States, the need for nursing students to graduate and enter the workforce was critical even prior to the COVID-19 pandemic. Innovative nursing education models are needed to mitigate the staggering shortfall. For over 10 years, the New Mexico Nursing Education Consortium (NMNEC) has been recognized as a successful pathway for students to achieve nursing degrees. The NMNEC is a collaborative partnership between university and community college nursing programs who offer a common curriculum and share common academic policies. Students in the community college setting choose an associate degree program or a co-enrolled associate degree/bachelor of science in nursing program. The NMNEC currently includes 16 nursing program sites throughout the state. The development of the NMNEC including its infrastructure, leadership council, committees, and involvement of program directors has contributed to the strength. The outcomes of NMNEC's nursing graduates have been exceptional with strong progression and NCLEX pass percentages. Since NMNEC's inception, diversity and health equity have been strong components of the NMNEC model and curriculum. The NMNEC model provides equity to students at rural community colleges to achieve a bachelor of science degree while remaining in their home settings.

Nursing education: From classroom to computers - The New Mexico Nursing Education Consortium's collaborative problem-solving during the pandemic.

The COVID-19 pandemic created an upheaval for nursing faculty teaching students in both didactic and clinical settings. From the intense disruption, opportunities for creative endeavors emerged. Program directors from a consortium of 12 nursing schools met remotely for problem-solving and support. Rich text from minutes of nine program director meetings were analyzed. Aims of our project included identifying challenges that nurse educators encountered during the pandemic, demonstrating benefits of a university and community college partnership model, and informing nurse educators of innovative outcomes that originated from our project. Thematic analysis of meeting minutes revealed four categories: timing and urgency; collaboration, preparation, and teaching; altruism; and what we learned. Further themes were identified from each of the categories. Innovative outcomes were identified from the text including creation of website teaching resources and development of a computer based clinical checklist. Implications for future nursing education included that computer- based simulation will continue to be embedded in nursing curricula. Also, the need for nursing faculty to remain technologically savvy to deliver trailblazing online pedagogies will prominently continue. We conclude that the synergistic collaboration of nursing program directors can have momentous outcomes for support and success of nursing programs.

Innovation in Academic Progression: Progress of the New Mexico Nursing Education Consortium Model.

AIM: The Institute of Medicine (IOM) challenged nursing education programs to increase the proportion of nurses with a baccalaureate degree in nursing to 80 percent by 2020. BACKGROUND: All 18 state-funded prelicensure nursing programs in New Mexico joined forces to create the New Mexico Nursing Education Consortium (NMNEC). METHOD: NMNEC is a model of collaboration with a statewide common curriculum that provides seamless transferability for students between schools while offering the BSN on community college campuses. RESULTS: Over three years, university partnerships with community colleges increased prelicensure BSN seats by 77 percent. CONCLUSION: This article describes the NMNEC model, challenges and opportunities associated with implementation, current program outcomes, and factors that have contributed to NMNEC's success. Also discussed are future steps for sustainability and growth as NMNEC continues in its commitment to meeting the IOM challenge.