College of Nursing Receives Grant to Prepare PhD Nurses

The University of Cincinnati (UC) College of Nursing is one of only 28 schools nationwide to receive a grant to increase the number of nurses holding PhDs. The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation Future of Nursing Scholars program will provide financial support, mentoring and leadership development to nurses who commit to earn their PhDs in three years. 

The UC College of Nursing is receiving its grants from the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center. It will select two scholars in March and those students will begin the Future of Nursing Scholars program this summer and their PhD studies this fall. 

"We are honored to have been selected for funding for the fourth cohort of scholars in the Future of Nursing Scholars program,” says Donna Shambley-Ebron, PhD, associate professor and PhD program director in the College of Nursing. "This has been an amazing experience for our current scholars who are preparing for the next generation of nursing leadership through research careers. We are indeed grateful to the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and to Cincinnati Children’s for providing us the opportunity to increase the numbers of doctorally-prepared nurses to continue and expand the knowledge-base of nursing.”

"The Future of Nursing Scholars program is making an incredible impact in real time,” said Julie Fairman, PhD, Future of Nursing Scholars program co-director and the Nightingale Professor of Nursing and Chair of the Department of Biobehavioral Health Sciences at the University of Pennsylvania School of Nursing. "These nurses will complete their PhDs in three years, a much quicker progression than is typically seen in nursing PhD programs.” 

In its landmark nursing report, the Institute of Medicine recommended that the country double the number of nurses with doctorates to prepare and enable nurses to lead change to advance health, promote nurse-led science and discovery and put more educators in place to prepare the next generation of nurses. The Future of Nursing Scholars program is intended to help address that recommendation.

The 51 nurses supported in this round will join 109 Scholars across the three previous national cohorts. The program plans to add a fifth cohort which will bring the number of funded Scholars to more than 200 nurses.