Graduate nursing program enters first year
Fourteen students are enrolled in the program, which was announced in the fall of 2020. It includes two different tracks and is taught primarily online, with one to three days each semester acting as meeting days in-person on the CSB campus.
The start of the 2021-22 school year marked new beginnings at St. Ben’s—the college is now offering graduate nursing programs.
“This is something that has been in the works, or at least started with a dream, for several years now,” said Jennifer Peterson, one of the co-chairs of the new program alongside Dr. Carrie Hoover. “My knowledge toward when we really started to look toward making it a possibility was probably somewhere around 2016, and starting to kind of investigate when or how to go forward with the process. And then the fall of 2019 was when we were given the official go-ahead from the college to really start to look to see how we could incorporate graduate programs here on campus.”
Establishing the program was a long process that started with the Faculty Senate and the Board of Trustees. Then, accreditation not only from the CSB and SJU accreditation bodies but also from the Minnesota Board of Nursing was needed, and finally, coordination with departments on campus such as the Registrar, Financial Aid, Admissions, Academic Advising and other support services.
The program has two tracks: a Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP)-Family Nurse Practitioner (FNP) track, and a Doctor of Nursing Practice–Leadership track. In the fall of 2022, CSB plans to add a third track, a Master of Science in Nursing.
Currently, there are 14 students in the programs—11 students in the DNP Family Nurse Practitioner track and three in the Leadership track. Goal enrollment numbers for the future are 12-18 students in the DNP track, 6-12 in the Leadership track, and six in the Masters program.
The programs work in a hybrid format, with the majority of the work being completed online. One to three days online each semester are in person, classified as meeting days at CSB. Those days will be used for students to engage with each other and utilize the hands-on skills taught throughout the semester.
For members of the program, that aspect has been a benefit, especially for ones who are working full-time like Karina Barabash, CSB class of 2016 graduate.
“I’m a mom of two toddlers and…I really did enjoy what I did in the rehab world, stroke care especially, and I wanted to stay there but learn more about how I can care for patients at a higher level of care. I saw the announcement and I just knew right away that St. Ben’s was the place to be—they have a stellar nursing program, and that’s my second home really, so in a way it was just the only option I even went with,” Barabash said.
Barabash is one of several CSB/SJU alumni in the program, alongside Brooklyn Loxtercamp.
“It is going well. The teachers and the professors have done a great job at making it flexible so we can do it with our work schedule and whenever we have some free time then I can do my assignments, so that’s really nice … I really like the way the program is set up,” said Loxtercamp.
Creating a program that retains undergraduate alumni and offers opportunities for non-CSB/SJU graduates was part of the creation design aspect for the programs.
“It’s a wonderful opportunity because it speaks to one of our many strengths in our undergraduate programs. We have a great RN/BSN program, and it has allowed us to build on that strength and allow continued education for our alums and other students interested in advanced careers in nursing,” said Barb May, Academic Dean.
Current undergraduate nursing students also see the benefit of adding graduate nursing programs at St. Ben’s, including current CSB sophomore Belle Handt.
“I thought it was super cool, especially since the first graduate program was going to be for nursing,” Handt said. “It just opened up my options for the future because I want to go to grad school after this. Just the possibility of potentially staying here for another few years would be nice, but also it just keeps more options open for the future.”