The University of Nebraska Board of Regents approved a proposal Friday that would allow the Lincoln Division of the UNMC College of Nursing to enhance its education facilities by moving to the Commerce Court Building at 1230 O St.
The move would be temporary, completed in time for the 2005-06 school year and will give the College of Nursing 24,779 square feet of space on three levels of the building.
“This is really exciting news for the College of Nursing,” said Dean Virginia Tilden, D.N.Sc. “We were desperately in need of upgrading our Lincoln facilities. Since 1976, the Lincoln nursing program has been housed in Benton and Fairfield Halls on the downtown UNL campus.
“These facilities are simply outdated and no longer suitable for teaching nursing students in the 21st century. The space actually interferes with the learning environment,” Dr. Tilden said. “The classrooms have internal wall supports, so this means students have to look around columns to see the instructor. The buildings don’t have central air conditioning, so when it gets warm, you have two choices – turn on the window air conditioners and make it difficult for the students to hear the instructor, or leave the air conditioners off and broil.”
Dr. Tilden said the Commerce Court Building will provide the College of Nursing with the state-of-the-art environment needed to educate nurses to practice in today’s complex health care settings. “It will allow us to install the sophisticated simulation labs and high technology classrooms that are essential today in nursing education,” she said. “It is perfect space for us. I couldn’t be more enthusiastic.”
The Commerce Court Building is owned by Ameritas Life Insurance Company. Under the new agreement, the university will have a seven-year lease with renewable options. The average annual cost is $259,367 with a total cost of $1.8 million over the seven years of the lease. The building is located just a few blocks from the downtown UNL campus.
The move to the Commerce Court Building will be temporary, Dr. Tilden said. The college hopes to begin a capital campaign to raise money for a new building which would be located adjacent of the UNMC College of Dentistry in Lincoln. The College of Dentistry is located on the University of Nebraska-Lincoln’s East Campus at 40th & Holdrege Streets. It’s estimated the new building would cost $7.5 million.
“Currently, we bring in about 70 undergraduate students a year in our Lincoln program,” Dr. Tilden said. “Because of the space restrictions in our old facilities, we have to turn away about 45 percent of the applicants to our Lincoln program. With the new space, I foresee that we will be able to increase the number of applicants we take by about 20 percent (about 15 more per year) and hire three new faculty.
“This is important, because there is presently a 10 percent shortfall of registered nurses in Nebraska. By the year 2020, that shortfall will have increased to 20 percent. Something needs to be done to address these nursing shortages, especially with the growing number of Nebraskans who will be elderly and require nursing care by 2020.”
The Lincoln Division enrolls175 undergraduate nursing students in its 2 ½-year upper level BSN program. Thirty faculty and 14 staff are employed in the Lincoln nursing program. The nursing program is highly competitive, Dr. Tilden said, with an average admitting GPA of 3.7 out of a possible 4.0.
Annually, about 65 new nurse graduates from the Lincoln Division enter the health care workforce with about 50 percent taking nursing positions in the Lincoln area.