Public Health Nursing Info Session | Fall 2021

I'll go ahead and mute since you're starting us off Bobby.

Hello everybody.

Thank you so much for joining us this evening.

We usually give about a minute, so we're going to start about 6:31 Eastern Time, so thanks for bearing with us and thanks again for joining us.

I see some familiar names on our list. That's great. Thanks again for joining us.

Alright, I've got 631 over here in good old Pleasant Ridge neighborhood in Cincinnati working from Hybrid right now. Working from home at the moment, so I hope you're all comfortable where you are and we hope that you find this information to be helpful. I'm Bobby.

I'm the admissions counselor for DNP programs. I've probably been bombarding you with lots of reminders emails about this event and the program, so we're so excited to be able to launch the program really this evening and present it to you tonight where I'm joined by Doctor Todd Turner Bicknell. She is the interim program director for the Public Health Nursing program, as well as Doctor Doctor Cynthia Becker, who is also a practicing nurse in one of the subfields that we're going to present as well. So just really quickly.

We're going to just to go over what we're going to talk about tonight. Talk about the length and the requirements for the BSN to DNP public health nursing program, and then I'll do the admissions requirements. Some program costs as well as funding at the very end. There's going to be a question and answer section as you can already tell you can see and hear us, but we can't see or hear you. But there is a built-in chat feature within your browser. It should be on the right hand side of your browser, so as questions come to you, feel free to send your questions.

In that chat we might get him to him right away if it has directly to do. If it has to do with that slide we're presenting right there. Otherwise we'll make sure to scroll back up to the top and hit all of your questions at the very end if something happens, or if you log out early or anything like that, you will receive a copy of this recording in a few days after it's done processing, and you'll also have the contact information for us in case you have any follow up questions. Alright, so before I turn it over to Doctor Tasha Bicknell I'm Turner Bignell, I'm so sorry.

I'll get it right eventually.

Just a couple things about the university. I've been with the university for three years as of next month as of November, and I'm so proud to be part of this school. Before I came here, I knew nothing about University of Cincinnati or the College of Nursing, but I do understand I've learned since then that the University of Cincinnati College of Nursing is very well known across the nation for the past five years and counting, we've been ranked within the top five. I'm sorry. Top 15 online graduate nursing programs in the entire country. By U.S. news and World Report.

In the region we are the only nationally ranked program at all, and we're one of only three top ranked programs in Ohio, so it's a very good place, just not only in the nation but also in the state. Overall rings top in the top 4% of all nursing programs in EU. S not just graduate nursing programs we had. We offered the very first Bachelor of Science in nursing program in the country over 130 years ago. So we've been fully accredited since accreditation was a thing. So that is not something you have to worry about if you come here. Join us.

At the University of Cincinnati, something that sets our graduate programs apart is that pretty much all of the faculty who teach DNP programs are, of course, is our DMP prepared, so you might go to another school you know, especially if it's a clinical program. You're looking at the people who you might be learning from might have a DNP and nursing education, or they might be a PhD nurse researcher. They're wonderful, they're great nurses. They contribute a lot, but they don't still do so, unlike other schools.

Pretty much all of our faculty still practice in the fields that they're teaching, so it's typically best to teach to learn from somebody who still does what they do. We have flexible scheduling will show you the schemas. Some sample schemas here in a little bit, but we do want to emphasize that you know we've got a minimum time to completion of eight semesters for this program, but you actually have up to five years to complete it. It can seem daunting. A lot of people you know you're entering a DNP program. You can be a little bit scared about time management, things like that if you work still.

If you've got family, but we're here to support you in that, and you're not going to be alone to navigate that, you'll have a wonderful academic advisor, Doctor Mike O'Neill. He's fantastic. He's been around for a long time and he really knows how to make the program work for students. Because of that, we've got very low attrition from our DMP programs and very high success rates. Are doctoral students receive priority funding consideration. This program is only offered as a DNP, which is a good thing because if we did offer it as an MSN, you would only qualify for federal loans.

But all of our DNP students do receive priority funding for in the different various ways that we have. We'll talk more about some of those opportunities coming up. We just a few weeks ago where re designated as a National League of Nursing Center of Excellence. So are some of our administrators were over in Washington DC and received that award on our behalf. So we're very proud of that as well. And then, of course, go kind of goes without saying. But this is 100% online coursework for this program. The only currently currently the only required campus visits going to be your DNP.

Project presentation, which happens the week that you graduate, and if you're going to be graduating with your doctor, you probably want to come to graduation and and you know, walk up there and get hooded by your program directors. So you'll be here anyways, so you might as well come here and present your project as well. All right, so I can go for on for days about this, but at this point I'm going to turn it over to Doctor Turner Bicknell.

Thank you so much Bobby. I'm happy to be here with you tonight. I'm excited about this new program. I'd like to start by introducing myself. As Bobby mentioned, you know my name is a little bit of a mouthful. It seemed like a good idea 24 years ago when I got married to hyphenate. You know now that I'm using it all the time, these last 16 years as a nurse? Not so sure, but I'm very happy to be with you. I'm extremely passionate about public health. I've had, you know I was a nontraditional student. I came to nursing.

A little later in life than a lot of other people, I've been a nurse now for about 16 years. Like most people most nurses I started at the bedside and worked in a busy trauma and orthopedic Med surg setting. Very early on I was really affected by the amount of preventable illness that I would see every day and that inpatient setting, and it really just drew me to go to the community and to see how I could work to, you know, meet people before they were.

In an acute care crisis, you know before someone's toe is black and we have to amputate it. How can we prevent that from happening? How can we meet you sooner? My background and cultural anthropology. I'm really prepared me well for working in public health and all of my work as a nurse. I have a real appreciation for the lived experience, the lived human experience, and it's very important to me to treat each person as they present in front of me with the human dignity that I would want to be treated with, and that I feel that they deserve.

I'm committed to equality, justice and healthcare reform. There is no question that our health care system in the United States is not the best in the world, and I think it could be so. I look forward to talking with you about this program will get started here.

Uh, so academic requirements. You know you'll want to have a BSN from an accredited School of Nursing. If you have an MSN we can kind of talk about that a little bit individually. Bobby can certainly answer questions about what that might look like, 'cause it might be very individualized depending on what type of MSN you have and what type of hours you may have done associated with it and what might look best for you. Recommended overall GPA of 3.25 or higher. A statistics course within the last.

With at least a B average.

The optional GREAGRE is not required for this program. If you have taken the GRE and you feel that it it lends something to your application and tells us something about you and you would like to share it, that's optional, but it is not required. We are committed to holistic admissions here at the college nursing. I like to look at the full picture and then we'll talk about that a little bit more as we move forward.

So the program the program length is 77 credit hours, 8 semesters of full time study, part time schema looks like about 11 semesters, but those last couple semesters when you're wrapping up the DMP with that 11 semester schema, it is a. It is more than two classes at a time, but as Bob you mentioned, there's a maximum time to complete the program of five years, so we could, you know, individually, be flexible about that part time schema as well.

So I wanted to talk for a minute about the role of the DMP, prepared public health nurse. I feel that public health nursing in general a lot of people just don't know a whole lot about it. I'll public health. Nursing is one of the oldest nursing specialties in the world down dating back to the 1800s. But what's the difference between a public health nurse that might have associates degree or bachelors degree and a DMP prepared nurse? DMP prepared public health nurses they work to apply the evidence from research.

To design, implement, and evaluate population based interventions. So just like we have DMP nurses in the hospital setting that are bringing the evidence from research to the bedside to improve patient care, we need those DNP nurses out in the population health space to be bringing evidence based practice to public health and to improve population health outcomes. We can work in a variety of settings, DMP prepared public health nurses are often in a leadership role prepared to assume leadership roles.

And local, state and federal public health agencies. Examples of these would be health Department's statewide health departments, this CDC, Indian health services, all those federal public health agencies. Also a variety of health systems across the country are beginning to pivot their services to the population health space, so various health systems also have interventions and programs that they're launching and running, and DMP prepared public health nurses.

It's a position to lead those programs as well. Non governmental public health organizations of course, often in federally qualified health centers. Grant funded public health initiatives as well, such as large herself projects and other projects that are funded by large grants where public health nurses can lead the implementation and evaluation of interventions in those spaces.

So let's talk for a minute about what the program really looks like. So what type of courses do we offer? So the BSN to DNP is exciting. Some people have asked me when they see me and they know that I'm working on this program. You know why a DNP? You know why not an MSN? If you'll notice a lot of health professions are moving towards the standard of the doctoral degree. We've seen that with physical therapy, audiology, and so the American Association of College of Nurses believes.

That the DMP is more reflective of the roles and responsibilities of the graduate prepared nurse and what we actually do. So into being congruent with other healthcare professions. The movement is towards the DMP.

I think you broke out for about 5 seconds there. Could you repeat what you said. Sorry about that.

Absolutely. Are you hearing me OK now?

Maybe I'm moving around too much.

And try to stay put.

When it so talking about the DNP that the DMP is becoming standard, becoming the standard for graduate preparedness similar to the other health professions that have moved towards that doctoral preparedness as a standard, including physical therapy, audiology, etc. So the American Association of College of Nurses is supports the movement to the DNP. They feel that it more accurately reflects the roles, responsibilities, competencies and capabilities of the graduate.

Prepared nurse.

So let's talk a little bit about the program. So the BSN to DNP so we uh program is somewhat unique in a number of ways. One, we're the only public health nursing DNP program in the Midwest in in the region. We have courses that focus on the social determinants of health. You see that there in semester one we have the principles of public health nursing. We have three of these courses. The first one.

Is really kind of an introductory bringing the students into that public health space, and I'm really introducing you to the work that is done there and how public health nurses work to develop interventions and to identify risk and then looking at public health negotiation and mediation, the public health is very interesting environment to work in. Many of you can think if you have. If you're interested in public health, you might notice that you have a public health Commissioner, often in the community.

That's often an elected official. There are often a variety of stakeholders in the public health space and mediation and negotiation is and is an extremely important skill for the public health nurse leader. You're often talking to community members talking to stakeholders, helping people understand, and it is really the role of public health leaders and experts to lead to let people know what they're at risk for.

And what evidence based interventions will be required to meet that risk? I think we're all acutely aware of that after living through a pandemic, and you know, seeing public health experts and not so much experts on TV and on social media. I think this will continue to be. I think this is the pandemic has really brought to bear some of the weaknesses in our American public health system, and we're going to continue to see a real emphasis on how can we strengthen our systems and how can we position.

Ourselves as public health leaders to be more prepared for the next pandemic and then and then the next one is the principles of public health, ethics, equity and advocacy. Advocacy, equity and ethics are extremely important in all areas of nursing practice, but we're going to specifically talk about them in the context of public health. Working towards there's there's a, there's a lot to talk about. You know, working towards health equity is. We've got a long way to go.

In this country, you know we have some some serious health disparities, and there is a you know threats to reproductive rights. And there's a lot to discuss there. And in that space talking about equity. In addition, you'll notice that we have the Specialty courses and then you have the DNP core courses that will be kind of, you know, moving you along towards getting prepared for that DNP project. And the external courses. Those were courses that are offered here at the University of Cincinnati and will be offered.

Through a distance learning format, but they're out of another college that we are partnering with. That's another real strength of our program is that we have we are a large university. We are an R1 research university so we have some of the best experts in the country here to teach some of these courses for us. So this one is environmental public health, which is an excellent course that is taught out of the Nyash Education Research Center which will talk about a little bit here in our next couple of slides.

And then moving into year two, you'll get into your public health nursing practical courses. This is another real advantage of our program. We have three public health nursing practicum courses that are built into the curriculum will in a little while, will look at the numbers. There's a certain 1000 hours of clinical hours that you'll do to achieve the DNP, and we built the 500 of those hours into these public health nursing practicum.

Courses practical 1/2 and three. This will really give the student the opportunity to be immersed in the public health setting to create relationships to potentially meet employers and to really get a chance to exercise and apply their knowledge, skills, and abilities under the auspice of our faculty.

And then additionally, you'll have an inter professional field experience and occupational health. That's an excellent course that I'm doctor Batcher can give us a little insight into when she talks a little bit about the occupational health track here in just a few minutes. And then of course your DNP courses as well.

And then in your last year. This is when you're really going to be coming around the bend with your DNP project so you don't have. You'll have more DNP courses and less of your specialty courses, but you will have a course called leveraging analytics and business intelligence tools for healthcare. I'm really excited to offer this course. I think that you know we public health all of all of healthcare, but particularly public health is extremely data driven. You know, I I base what?

I do on what the data is telling me. You know what are the overdose death rates in my state? What are they county by county? Where do we need to target our interventions? What are we doing and how effective is it? That's all through data analysis and so this is an exciting course offered out of the health informatics program and allied health here at the University of Cincinnati. That's really about leveraging that data as a tool for health care, and I think that's just an essential part of the work that we do. And then you'll also take.

A global and cross cultural health course here out of the College of Nursing as well, which is a great course in global health. We all know that we live in a global society and that we you know during non pandemic times we move around and work in different spaces and even if you continue to serve in your own community, having that understanding of the global community is extremely important in this work that we do.

For all nurses, and especially relevant in public health, so this program has two tracks and so track one is advanced public health nursing and track two is occupational health nursing. Occupational health nursing is under the umbrella of public health. It is a part of public health nursing and aspect of but really focusing on people when they're on the job and looking at the occupational risks and exposures that are inherent there. If you think about the average person and and you think about how much.

Of our life we spend at work. It really kind of puts into perspective the emphasis that we need to place on occupational health that we're spending much more of our life often at work. Then we are doing other things. So I'm really working with populations to understand. You know how to do their work, but to also protect their health and Wellness while they're doing it. We have excellent courses in this program that are offered out of the NIOSH which is the National Institute of Occupational Safety and Health.

ER C, which stands for Education Research Center and we're going to talk about that in just a moment. But looking at the courses so you'll take, you would still take the principles of population health course and the social determinants of health course. Then, occupational students will take an occupational health hygiene and safety workshop. They will also take epidemiology. And then there's an occupational and environmental disease and hygiene course that'll be taken semester 3.

And then in semester one of the second year, you'll take the public health nursing Practicum 2 and then also the occupational Hygiene and Safety Workshop 2.

Public health practicum. Three in Semester 2 and then principles of public health, ethics, equity and advocacy. You'll take that that second year in Semester 3, so very similar, but slightly different and then really focusing on that specialty of occupational health, you'll have the interprofessional field experience and occupational health.

And then add leveraging analytics and business intelligence tools for healthcare and then the population density course there as well.

So that's kind of a broad picture of the schema for both tracks of the program. Let's talk a little bit about the track. Two of the program Occupational Health nursing. So University of Cincinnati Educational Research Center. It was among the original first education research centers to be funded by the National Institute of Occupational Health and Safety. So, and we have a long history of demonstrated excellence at the UCR. See it has been continuously funded for 45 years.

Since 1977 and it's the oldest center in the university.

The interprofessional program with faculty and students from occupational health nursing, occupational medicine, Occupational Safety and health engineering, industrial hygiene, ergonomics, and bio monitoring. Students participate in coursework in clinicals in collaboration with students from other programs. So at this point I want to introduce my my dear colleague, Dr Betcher, who is a member of the faculty here at the University of Cincinnati College of Nursing and also.

A member of the RC Anulom of the program.

Thank you Doctor Turner bicknall. Can you hear me?

Yes, good thank you. Well welcome each of you. I'm so excited to be discussing this topic with you and I really appreciate what Doctor, Turner, Bicknell and and Bobby Roo have have shared with you already. I think it's been a very accurate description of what is offered and really, the value of a program like this and that's why I'm personally really excited about this.

But I my background is I went to a hospital school this so a long time ago before my RN and I worked in Med surg just like Doctor Turner Bicknell for many years and rehab, nursing and other types of things. I was a school nurse for 14 years which I loved and there's actually some occupation more occupational health nursing in school nursing than I imagined there would be. So I was really caring for a lot of the employees.

Along with the students in that environment. But I learned a lot and but I also worked for in my career path I worked for a medical cost containment company and I was doing nurse case management for injured workers and that's where I developed an appreciation for occupational health. I sort of a I just sort of had an introduction to what that might be like and and really my eyes were opened to exactly what Doctor?

Turn back now was referring to in you know how how much of our lives, as she mentioned, are in our workplaces and in some cases as she also mentioned, there's so many disparities in health care in our country and other countries, sometimes that.

The workplace may be the one connection to some, at least referrals for health care and possibly some kind of coverage for the workers as well. And it would also then include, you know temporary workers, migrant workers, anybody in the work environment. So I got an interest in that, and so when I was interested in pursuing my Masters degree, I would.

Gravitated toward the occupational health nursing and did achieve that masters. And then I did actually go back then after I started teaching at the university to get my DNP and I finished that up at the University of Cincinnati, and I did actually have a focus on occupational health nursing, but there it wasn't a a program like what is being described to this evening, where it was really designed that way. I was in the program.

It was really a general DNP, but it just so happened. My interest was in occupational health nursing and so that's where my project focused.

I also teach community health nursing in our armed BSN program and in some of our bachelor programs as well and and and as doctor turn back now mentioned. I am also teaching the the ER C The Education Research Center interdisciplinary Field Experience course.

So the field experiences are offered to any student in the ER, C, and as Doctor Turner. Bicknell also indicated there are four disciplines within that. The ER C, including as she mentioned industrial hygiene and biomonitoring ergonomics and also industrial engineering. The College of Medicine, Occupational Health, Occupational medicine residents.

And occupational health nursing. So I agree that it is such.

I believe an asset to the program that we have these interdisciplinary activities. Not only do we do these field trips and column field experiences now, 'cause some of them had to be virtual during the height of the pandemic, but but field trips, field experiences, whatever you'd like to call it. And and I think there's so much value in in experiencing those together with the other disciplines because afterward we have a little debrief and we talk about it and it's so interesting.

For the perspectives of those other disciplines, you know 'cause I'm coming from the nursing perspective and they're like, well, but what I saw as we walked through that I don't know. Assembly line factory or whatever it was we were touring, you know, they they see something different than what I would as a nurse. So it's really, I think a great experience. Plus the workshop class where we get to do a project with these other disciplines. It it was very eye opening to me.

I was shy at first because I was kind of intimidated by some of the really like heavy science type people that were in that group and I didn't say anything for the first couple weeks. But then finally, I kind of got my confidence going and felt like, you know, I I maybe did have something to contribute and and and when I shared my perspective, they're like, oh, that's really interesting. They never, you know, they don't think like nurses. So so when I was able to share my perspective that was eye opening to them as well. So then I felt.

A little better about being a member in a group like that and and they were great and I really just loved him and I I learned so much from the in the program there as Doctor Terminal. Also mentioned there are these practicum experiences, which of course anytime you can have a practicum. I think in any field. Really, there's so much value and just seeing how it really works day-to-day. There's a lot of value in our courses and learning the evidence based practice from you know textbooks and.

And you know, peer reviewed journal articles and and the resources that we use in the academic setting. But then when you're really out there like shadowing or working with some of the folks who are doing occupational health nursing day-to-day, whether it's a research you know, researcher or someone who's in, let's say, a clinic at the sight of a of a workplace, there's so much value and just seeing the reality of what?

Goes on every day and what the challenges are, as well as the rewards and and how those challenges are overcome. But truly I agree with Doctor Turner Mcnell that public health community health nursing is where the future of healthcare lies and I think as she mentioned, COVID-19 has really opened our eyes to the reality of that. And we've been saying that for years, but I think.

During the pandemic, we really saw it, you know, coming to the forefront and that people were beginning to recognize more. The value of public and community health. And as you know, you know. When I was first in nursing school, length of stay in hospital was lengthy and now it is not, you know, we we get the same surgery used to have back then and we would be a week or so in the hospital. And and now you know the patient is discharged from the hospital.

Either that same day or the next day come so often and and so where does that person go when they leave the hospital there? They may get a rehab. They might, but many times they're going home so they need that support in the community and and and so I, I truly believe that the future of health care in this country and I'm sure other countries relies and depends on public health nursing.

I would also mention we do have a professional association. That's a National Association of Occupational Health nurses, so wherever you are living, there's very likely a local chapter, a state chapter. But then there's always the national chapter, so if you're interested in that, you can just Google. I think ahn.org to learn a little bit more about what public health, or rather what occupational health nursing is about, and that's our group. Really, that's the.

It is our advocacy as well as a group of nurses. If there are questions and things even in the legal realm that are happening that affect occupational health, this is. This is where you know numbers influence outcomes and so.

It is helpful to be involved in the professional organization of your selected you know specialty in nursing. So I would love to talk to anybody who would like to talk to me about this topic at anytime. 'cause it's one of my favorite subjects it couldn't tell.

So, but I'm looking forward to meeting each of you. I hope in the near future and but if anybody has a question about what I contributed to the evening, I would love to discuss it with you. So thank you for your time.

Would you mind?

Would you mind dropping your email address in the chat?

Thank you so much, doctor venture.

Of course, thank you.

Oh great, thank you so much. You know it's it's such a wonderful program.

Such a wonderful part of the program. All right, we're going to switch gears just a little bit and talk about our DNP practicum hours, which are relevant for students with either track, you know, students complete a minimum of 1000 post baccalaureate practice hours so the American Association of Colleges of Nursing. If if you're not familiar with that, we often refer to that as the ACN and they put forth the essentials of doctorate education for advanced practice nursing and I'm students in both.

Tracks will complete on DNP practicum hours. You'll have 500 hours in your DNP practicum 1/2 and three and then clinical practice experience will be provided to students. The opportunity to apply new knowledge and demonstrate the achievement of those outcomes. Practicum course faculty.

Oh, I'm sorry.

Doctor Betcher, I think we need you to mute for us if you would. No problem, no problem.

A practical course, faculty work closely with students in clinical partners to supervise and support the student in that professional setting. So all DNP students, regardless of what kind of program you're doing, will complete a DNP scholarly project. It serves as the culminating project often revolves around quality improvement or evidence based practice, so sometimes people will say to me, you know, what is the difference between a DNP prepared nurse or a PhD? Or why did you get a DMP and not a PhD?

The DNP does not it. We're not research focused, you know. I don't do research. What I do is I bring the research from the evidence from research to practice to improve patient outcomes. So that's one of the big differences. So the projects are often centralized around. What should we be doing that the evidence tells us we should be doing that we're not doing or not doing enough? And then often these projects build a case for practice, change that.

Based on what we're doing, we're going to see a practice change and that this is something that we should be doing, so it's pretty. It's pretty fun and exciting, and I think so. The three public health practicum's public health practicum 1/2 in three really are designed to immerse students in a public Health Organization and give them the opportunity to apply skills to gain experience in the field. To meet people, develop connections, relationships, students.

Demonstrate achievement of the essential competencies of the DNP prepared nurse on this previous slide. Here I have a visual there from the AAC N of the DNP essentials. If you're looking at DMP programs, I encourage you to look that up. You can Google it. Look and see what those DNP essentials are, because that's really what your courses are going to be centered around and there is a minimum of 500 practice hours built into those into our public health practicum courses.

In the occupational health track and track two we they will take you will take practicum health public health practicum two and three, and then two workshop courses that will all count towards those hours. There's one interprofessional field experience course, and there is a minimum of 500 hours built into that curriculum as well. So why the DNP? We talked about this a little bit already, but the Doctor of Nursing practice is designed for nurses seeking a terminal.

Be in nursing practice rather than a research focus doctor it the doctorate of nursing practice programs, prepare students to translate the evidence from nursing research and other disciplines to bring it to practice to improve health outcomes. The DNP coursework culminates in that student driven DNP scholarly project and all the courses that you take along the way. We're really working up to, you know, getting you there. It's not like you get to that last semester, and it's like.

So I have to do a project. You know it's really scaffold where we, you know we want to talk about your idea. We want to approve your idea. We want to strengthen it when it really help you put you in a position to be successful. The DNP Public health nurse is prepared to navigate the Multiplex of public health systems and implement public health programs based on science, which many of us might say that we need more today than we ever have.

And at this time I think I'm gonna turn it over. Let me actually, I'll talk a little bit about holistic admissions before I turn it over. I'm to Bobby rude to talk a little bit more about our admissions process. We use a holistic admissions here at the University of Cincinnati College of Nursing. Every element counts. We really take quite a bit of things into consideration. We look at your GPA. Some people might choose to retake courses if they feel like that might make them more competitive, or if you feel like a certain.

Course grade that you earned doesn't really reflect your abilities. You want to have a nice clean personal statement. I think the personal statement might be the most important piece of your admission packet. It's your opportunity to really tell us who you are. There's a lot of writing in the doctoral program, so it also gives us a glimpse of your abilities to write and express yourself. In written word, we and it also gives you an opportunity to tell us why you want to do.

This is why you're interested in public health and really demonstrate some of your passion. The resume. Of course, you want to make sure it looks nice and clean. Good recommendations of course, and a strong interview.

And I'll turn it over to Bobby Roode to talk a little bit more about our admissions process.

Alright, so it's a lot of information to take in, but luckily like I said, we're going to have this video processing a couple days and I'll get it emailed out to you as soon as possible so you can review details about the program or the admissions process. All right, so we have divided the admissions process into three basic steps. There's really four steps if you include the interview, but the three basic Subs, at least for your nursing cast materials, so everything you're going to upload or submit it.

Everything is going to go to nursing CAS. Don't send anything to the university, especially transcripts. If you send transcripts to the university, I cannot send them to nursing cast for you because they have to be addressed to nursing CAS because they are that centralized application system which is what cat stands for. That's actually run by the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, so they're just, you know, they're watching us. They're really interested in seeing how this is going to play out for us, so make sure make sure it goes to nursing casts so you do have to enter the names and attendance dates from all of your higher education.

Institutions, we also need transcripts from them. The transcripts are not do right away. So when we say all all higher education institutions, we mean all of them. If you took one summer course, but you did the rest of your bachelors education at the same school, we still need that official transcript from that school. A pretty common question about transcripts. We are aware that some programs at the University of Cincinnati and some other universities are OK with unofficial transcripts. What happens?

When does school accepts an unofficial transcript is that you send the unofficial of one first, then you have to send the official one later we just get right to it and we just get the official run wide away. The official one right away, so you're not wasting anytime later.

So that's going to be entered into your nursing cast application name and attended dates. Attendance dates from your schools. You're going to upload your resume and personal statement. It's best, I think if they're PDF's you can do word. I think it gives the opportunity to preview your documents. Sometimes word documents get a little bit messed up on formatting. If that happens, it's not that it's not the worst thing. I'll just email you and say, hey, can you resubmit this to me so I can send it on to review? Not a huge deal, but if you just want to do it as a PDF, that's going to be a.

Sort of a sure bet and getting the right format in there. You're going to pull your nursing license from your states RN verification website or from nurses. I think there's this isa.org. I'm pretty sure it's a.org, so it's got. It's got to indicate the issuing date. The fact that it is unencumbered and it has to have the expiration day. So we did all of that information. It's not the Pretty Little certificate you get with little gold, little gold seal on. It's not that one. We have to have the proof that you are in.

Good standing up. This program does not require to you to have your RN right away. I'm sorry that's not true. It requires it does not require. You have experience. Let me revise that. It does not require a year of experience before you can start in the program. If you are admitted without experience, you're expected to work during that. That means for some of you you might not have your RN license right away. Let me know if that's an issue so we can work at work with you for it.

In nursing, cast as well, you're going to enter the names and contact information for a minimum of three or a maximum of six letters of recommendation. Your references are going to receive an email from nursing CAS inviting them to complete their reference to complete that letter upload and a Likert scale evaluation. As part of that process, make sure they also click submit. A lot of people you know do the letter upload. They do the evaluation, but they forget to click submit, so your application just sitting there not getting processed so.

That might be just a little hint. See if you want to follow up with your references about that. If it's getting to the deadline, which the Part 2 deadline, that that's when your references are actually do. If it's getting close to that, just email me. If they haven't completed their work, I'm happy to send them a friendly reminder with instructions. Just let me know what I can do to help the question section. There's just a few questions that we have in the application you have to do coursework entry so coursework entry is kind of a unique thing that a lot of most nursing CAS schools do this.

But what the coursework entry enables us to do is it allows us to accurately pull your overall GPA and then extract a separate science GPA. If we were to do that ourselves, for every single student, we wouldn't have time to do anything else, so we just ask you for you to go order an unofficial set of transcripts from your schools or an official transcript doesn't really matter, but you're going to go school by school, semester by semester, line by line, and just enter the course number and prefix the course title. The grade you got, and the number of credits that course.

Was worth it. Sounds like a lot of work, but it really doesn't take that long if you don't want to do it yourself, or let's say you're one or two days before the deadline, then you can pay for professional transcript entry. It's not required to. Some applicants think. I don't think they word it very clearly on nursing CAS, but some applicants think it's required. It is not required. You do not have to pay for it, so if you've got the time, definitely do your coursework, enter yourself, and then your nursing test feeds $75 for your nursing CAS fee. I'm realizing, oh, I think I skipped.

I skipped a slide here, so part one is due April 15th, 2022. We do have a priority deadline on January 15th. Basically what the priority deadline means is that between January and 15th and April 15th. I'm sorry. Before January 15th we promise we're not going to close the program in case it fills. So after January 15th between January 15th and April 15th, if if we reach capacity for the program, there are only so many seats in the program. So if you reach capacity.

Then we might close the application. I do give you one or two weeks notice ahead of time, so you can try and get part one completed, but really it's completing part one. It's getting to the point of submitting your nursing cast fee that keeps you safe for consideration.

Now Part 2 is due May 15th. I'm going to talk about Part 2 right here. So a month after that last final part, one deadline is when your transcripts, recommendations and English proficiency scores are due. That means that official transcripts have a right at arrived at nursing casts. All of your recommendations are completed. If you're an international student who maybe did your bachelors degree in a different country, or especially a country where English is not the primary language, then we might need your English proficiency scores. There are waivers.

For that available, let's say if you are from a country where English is not their first language, but you did your bachelors degree in the US or the UK or Canada, then we can waive that for you. Or if you did your bachelors degree in another country, but you're now a full U.S. citizen, obviously you speak playing the language, and especially if you're working, nurse in the US, you've got the English proficiency skills, so we would waive that for you. Let me know if you've got any questions about that, then part three is the Graduate School application, the University of Cincinnati Graduate School has.

Their own application processing fee of $65 seventy dollars. For international students, this will not be requested until after your nursing CAS application hasn't verified status. Verified status means that everything is in. Your transcripts are in nursing. CAS has gone through your coursework entry and they verify that everything is accurate and then they've calculated your GPS for us. So one or they'll let you know when you're verified and one or two days after you're verified is when they graduate. Graduate School at UC is going to email you for their separate fee after you submit that feed, then I can send all over your application materials.

For for review, so to go over that timeline again. Priority deadlines January 15th. Part One is the last day you can submit your nursing CAS fees April 15th. That's assuming the program doesn't fill. So just basically. The point here is to submit that nursing CAS fee as soon as possible.

Uhm, no matter when we close the application, transcripts and references aren't going to be due until May 15th. And then you have to submit your UC Graduate School fee, which is part three by June 15th.

Alright, so so after I send your application for review your nursing CAS application for review and you are a qualified, we want to hear more about you then I'll send you the information about the interview. It's alive online interview. We have used Webex in the past. We might use zoom. Depends on what we're working with at the time because it's just the school likes to change things, sometimes all right. So hopefully you're accepted. That's always our goal. We want to see you succeed. We usually get your decision within three weeks of the submission of your.

UC Graduate School application? That's going to sort of depend on scheduling. You know, if your schedule is kind of tight right away, and doctor Turner Big Mills schedule is kind of tight as well. If it takes a little longer than that, then that's OK. We're not going to hold that against you will get you in as soon as we can, usually within one or two days of your interview I will get your decision to you. Sometimes the day of if it's like a morning interview, but we do our best to really speed up the process from that point on. If you are admitted, then you've got 15 business days. So three weeks.

Basically, to complete a confirmation form and the matriculation fee, the matriculation fees really just deposit it goes towards your first semesters, tuition and fees. If your University of Cincinnati graduate, then email me so that I can have that fee waived for you. We love waiving fees, so whatever we can do to help, we're happy to do that. But you do have to let me know that you need that you need it waived. I unfortunately got. I've managed 17 programs here at the university, so it's really hard to keep track when decisions are going out. So just.

Email me and I'll take care of that for you.

Alright, I've got a couple questions here in the chat that we can hit really quickly. Lee is at Leah is asking if you previously went to UC undergrad or grad school. Is that transcript sending still necessary? Yes, so there's a couple things to that. So nursing cast does those calculations for us. So if you want to, you see in another school they're going to re calculate that for you. But on top of that, our goal is an equitable application process, so if we require one thing for one applicant, we require the same thing for the other applicants, so it just you know.

Everyone's on a level playing field, so if someone has to pay for their transcript to be sent, so does the next person. Even though you are a UC graduate, which we love, the fact that you're looking back at us but the one thing I can do is for you as wave that matriculation fee. If you're admitted today is asking I know that the program is 100% online, but will there be any zoom or virtual classroom work? Do you want to take that one? Yeah.

Yeah, sure I can speak to that. Thanks for the question, Janae. I'm sure that that will be on the mind of other people who are looking at this program as well. There won't be any.

Live or what we call synchronous zoom classroom work. Like courses that require that throughout the program throughout the whole, you know eight semester program. There may be opportunities to join things. For example, if someone was in the occupational health nursing track and they wanted to participate in a virtual interprofessional site visit, you would have the opportunity to do that. Now what we hope you know. We recognize that our students often.

Are engaged in full-time employment and have many other commitments, so our hope is that we would let you know way in advance of those dates and that people who wanted to could join us. Similarly, there might be once a year during the summer there might be what we call an intensive where and that and there would be a virtual option for that. Where you know we would get together and perhaps do something live. But again that wouldn't be a course, it would never be a whole course. It would be more like an event.

And we would we would want to let you know way in advance and we would be willing to work with students who couldn't attend as well.

Thank you, keep your questions coming. If they have to, you know we'll get to as we can. If we get a ton of questions, will just hit him up at the end. Alright, so probably question on everybody's mind. How much is this going to cost me? So luckily the tuition and fees at the University of Cincinnati have been very stable. And since I've been here and I'm pretty sure in the in the couple years previously as well.

Uh Oh my mind is dark two. Don't worry about it. So I've got sorry I should have changed the date on that. That is actually the 21 to 22 tuition and fees. It does vary by year, so any of the costs on the next slide that I showed you, those are just estimates. Like I said, it's been very stable. I think it's gone up, maybe $15 since I've been here. It's really not a big deal for us, but we know that some other schools have had some pretty major tuition and fee hikes. Hopefully that doesn't happen to us.

But remember that if it does, it's out of our hands and we apologize in advance. So what I'm showing you is all current. That's as of today, if tuition and fees did not change, that's what these estimates on the next slide are going to be. So we've got sort of two classifications. If you want to think about it like that. So we've got not only, well, guess. Yeah, 2 + 2. So we've got in state tuition and fee rates, and then out of state tuition and fee rates. It's only $15 different if you're out of state and then Kentucky residents pay the same as in state so.

Uhm, we actually did a comparison of the other top 20 schools that are ranked by U.S. news and World Report. We are currently ranked number 14 but were 30% less expensive than the other top 20 schools. So our ranking plus our history plus the quality of our program really makes us an excellent value. So when you're comparing us to other schools, keep that in mind. We embrace the fact that we are not the cheapest school out there, but we also embrace the fact that we were very very good school. So we've got the flat rates. So if you're.

Enrolling in 10 credits or more per semester, you're paying a flat rate basically of the tuition fee, times 10 credits, so that applies to 10 credits to 18 credits. I believe out of state again is just ten, basically 10 times that per credit rate. If you are enrolling 9 credits or less per semester, then you're just paying per credit. I do a breakdown on the next screen to let you know what I'm to let you know I'm talking about. For the program. There is a $563 online learning.

Feed that is just one time per semester, something else to keep in mind when you're comparing programs. Some programs do not list all of their fees. We try our best to do that. I think I've included everything here, but if you're comparing us to a school who's only listening tuition that I believe ours is $661 per credit.

Uhm, alright, so here are the two tracks you can see that there's the advanced public health nursing nursing track is 77 credits. If you're doing that, talk health track. It's 78 credits. It's just that one credit difference. And if you look down at their at the totals at the bottom even though the AC health track is one credit more, it actually costs a little bit less, but that's because you've got. You've got more of the per credit semesters. That's going to kind of save you some money in there.

It's just how it works out so that that's those are just estimates. It's what I'm looking at right now, but you can. Like I said, you can see the difference between in state and out of state's. Really not that major.

Funding alright, so we are happy to report that we offered $2.2 million in the 2021 2020 21 school year, several things that we offer here at the University of Cincinnati. We've got a scholarship search tool that is available through the Financial aid office. You can search for different opportunities on there. We don't list them individually because they do sort of cycle through as like a deadline closes. They're going to remove it, so it's not really worth showing.

Everything but some that we always offer going to graduate incentive award and the Nurse Faculty loan program just a little bit about the Graduate Incentive award. I do list it and I strongly encourage DNP students to apply for it. If you're applying for the fall 2022 term, you're going to want to have your decision before June 1st, because that's when that graduate innocent incentive award application is due. So if you are getting your decision letter, that's really close to that. You probably not going to.

Make it in time for it, unfortunately. So we really want you to apply early for a couple reasons really, and then the Nurse faculty loan program. We've got a slide on that that I believe that Doctor Turner Bignell is going to talk about. But don't forget the other funding sources. Besides any kind of benefits that your employer might offer, we know that the University of Cincinnati Medical Center and Cincinnati Children's Hospital in the VA do a really good job of that. But if you're not in the area, it's really likely that your institution offers some kind of benefit as well, so make sure to check with them.

Otherwise Fastweb Sallie Mae they've got us a place just for grad scholarships. Check him out. It doesn't hurt to apply. Usually it's just like an essay. That's usually what most of them want. It's it's worth your time to get some money to put towards your education. And then, of course, all DNP students are fully eligible for any kind of federal grants and student loans. If you have not done grad school before, like I have done far too much grad school. I'm very familiar with how it works for grad students, but if you still have undergraduate loans

just remember that that's a separate bucket, so you've got your undergrad bucket and you've got your graduate bucket. The graduate buckets pretty big.

It's very, it's very well I want to say generous, but they give you a lot of money if you need a lot of money, gotta pay it back, but remember that that's kind of how that works. If you've got questions about that, I'm more than happy to talk about it.

Yes.

Leah is asking a couple things. Will there be another start to the program despite besides next fall? No, it only starts in the fall and the fall 2022 is going to be our first term for it that we will not do a spring or summer start term at this point in time and I think you're talking about the costlier for that would be if you're coming with a BSN, correct? Yeah, so that would be go ahead.

And I just wanted to add that, you know, we we do plan to admit every fall. So if for any reason you were feeling like this, you know this next fall wasn't going to be a good fit for you for some reason. We do plan to admit for the program the next year.

So if yeah, so those are the those are the costs if you if you're coming within with a BSN with no transfer credits whatsoever, that's going to be your cost transfer. Credits are always a case by case basis. If you got an MSN, definitely talk to me before you start your program or before you start your application. Because there's not only the full DNP public health path, but there's another one we can talk about as well for a few students that might apply to that's going to totally make you in a different situation though.

Learning different grad program currently. So yeah, I mean just send me some information about what it is. I'll take a peek. We don't make any promises because that's all determined after acceptance, but that we can at least get an idea of what you're coming in with.

Alright, so here's the nurse faculty loan program.

Alright, thank you. I'm so the nurse properly loan program is a pretty exciting program for those of you who may not know anything about it. It's a federal program. It's often referred to as the NFLP program, and it provides an 85% reduction of your tuition and fees so you can. Some people use the word forgiveness. It's kind of like a forgiveness program that's based on work and what work it is based on. It's based on you teaching for four years in the United States.

And the Virgin Islands. My husband always likes to point that out to me. I'm an alumna of this program and he always likes to remind me that don't forget, we could be teaching in the Virgin Islands just in case you get an offer there. But in all seriousness that you can complete your DNP and the certified Nurse educator credentials for around $10,000 with this program. So who do I think is a good fit for this program? So for me when I did this program, I was someone who was really engaged in public health work. Really passionate about public health, but I was also teaching.

And so you know, if you're already teaching some of you, even with your BSN, might be teaching adjunct on some of you might have a little more education and might already be teaching if you've never taught before, but you think you're really interested in it. That doesn't mean that it's not for you, but you know, the onus will be on you to obtain that job and to teach for four years, I'm following your graduation, so you teach to four years full time at any accredited nursing program in the United States and the Virgin Islands, and.

You apply after acceptance. You can here at the University center. You can also get that nurse educator certificate, which is a nice thing to add to your CV and your tool kit and it is of course 100% online as well. And you know most of our students in this program of course. And all of our a lot of our other programs are distance learners, so that's important to us to offer that certificate in a distance learning format. So it's a great program, but you know you wouldn't want to be some if you think to yourself. I don't think I would ever want to teach.

Probably not for you, but if you're someone who's maybe teaching a little bit now and thinking you know it wouldn't be bad to do more of that and think you could do it full time for a minimum of four years, it could be a great opportunity for you and I'm happy to answer any questions Melanie Kroger Jarvis here at the College in nursing is the director for that program. She's excellent and as someone who participated in the program, I'm also happy to answer any questions.

Great.

No, I ducked about at the beginning. I'm going to put you on the spot here a little bit, but I talked about the beginning why I thought we were a great program. Do you have anything to add to that?

Me, yes, I do. You know I of course everything that you mentioned, of course, and this is my fifth year here at the University of Cincinnati. I taught for a small university for five years before I came here. I love you see, it is such a research and resource rich environment. There are lots of opportunities here and lots of exciting things going on. I like that we have an academic Health Center that we have, you know, a College of Medicine pharmacy, physical therapy.

All of the Allied health programs. All of you know, so I think there's a lot of excitement about the work that we do here. And we hear from our distance learning students that they feel that excitement to even, you know, even though you're not necessarily on campus, we really design our programs to engage with students. We want you to feel part of the greater UC community. We're also committed to diversity and inclusion. We have the most diverse student body that we have ever had this year welcoming 47,000 students to the University of Cincinnati.

And our research programs, not just in nursing and medicine, but in other areas of the university, are continuously growing. And we're also really interested in looking forward and looking at our community. And I like being in an environment where we're here. We want to serve the community that we're in. We don't want to just be plopped down somewhere and be a silo, but we want to reach out into the community and really be embedded in it and make a real impact and difference in the community. And that's probably my favorite thing about the University of Cincinnati.

Great, we'll open it up for questions now. I see we've got a couple already. Case he's asking, will you be able to work as an NP with this degree?

This is this is not a. This is not a nurse practitioner program, so if you're I I think I need to know a little bit about what your question is asking. Are you saying that you already have an MP and you want to add this to it? So an example of that would be someone who is maybe an MP in a certain practice area and they're looking to pivot their career into the population health space, and I think this could be a great program for that. But if you're asking if this program if this program has a nurse practitioner component to it.

It does not.

I hate to tell you this, but it broke out until you said this is not.

I I said that depending on what your question is, it could be two things. Are you a nurse practitioner who's wanting to pivot their career into public health? Then this could be a great program for that candidate. If you're asking is a nurse practitioner, is a is an NP embedded in this program, the answer is no, and which makes sense. This degree is focused on population health, so there's no need for prescriptive authority. You're not providing care to individual.

People you are developing interventions for groups of people and populations.

Yeah, no, I know it.

Great yeah no. I know it's confusing what I like. I said at the beginning I'm not a nurse when I came into this I didn't know anything about what was going on and so many options for nurses. It's incredible.

Uh huh.

Up in mix and match and find your best fit so will hang on for a few minutes.

Yeah, in case you feel fear that, feel free to clarify. If I didn't really get it, your question, but I think I think that that's what I. That's what I took from it.

Mobile.

Yeah, send your questions in the chat. There will if you know if there's a long pause and nobody no one is saying anything. Of course will log off. So if you need to go get going right now, we don't want to hold you captive. Once again, thank you so much for joining us this evening. Reach out to us with any questions you have.

Absolutely.

I think Doctor Betcher is is still online as well. If you've got any questions for her.

And it's great to it's.

And it's great.

It's great to see that.

It's great to see that.

I'm not sure why it's doing this.

Not sure why it's doing this.

I was going to say it's great to see this up.

I was going to say it's great to see that someone had Melanie Dr. Crover Jarvis as an undergrad instructor. That's always nice to see.

Yeah, just send me some information about what's your MSN is and we can see what we can do.

Thank you Jeanette. Thanks for coming.

Participating starting this green out now.

Alright, I can see participating starting to stream out now, so I think we'll wrap it up once again, thank you all so much. Contact me with any questions you might have and have a great night.

Absolutely thank you so much, thank you.

Bye.

We think it's exciting too.

Thank you Bobby.

And thank you, Cynthia for coming and sharing your experience.