My major concerns regarding instructors during nursing school were more about which ones I would be assigned and if I would “survive” the semester, than about whether there were enough teachers to go around.

In all seriousness, nursing is a course of study that requires a great deal of instructor attention and close supervision, especially in the clinical phase when students deal with their first actual patients. In fact, the recommended instructor to student ratio in school isn’t too far off from the recommended nurse to patient ration in the real world.

Accredited nursing programs across the country are struggling to fill open instructor slots so that qualified applicants with the desire to enter this recession proof field can get started. In 2006-7, an estimated 99,000 qualified RN nursing program applicants (40 percent of all applications submitted) were turned away, due to a lack of instructors. Fortunately, state and federal lawmakers are also jumping in and lending a helping hand to nursing schools.

In California, one of the states with the fewest nurses per capita, Senator Barbara Boxer has introduced legislation to establish mandatory nurse-to-patient ratios. The new law would also award stipends to nursing students who commit to working at clinics and other facilities that serve patient populations most in need.

California has also allocated $60 million in grant money for programs that will fund specialty training at community colleges while training nursing instructors. The “golden state” needs to educate about 206,000 more nurses and health care workers by 2014 to keep up with population demands.

At the federal level, the pieces of President Obama’s 2010 budget proposal that address the nursing shortage and corresponding nursing faculty shortage, are being praised by The National League for Nursing. The specific legislation affected is Title VIII and VII. The proposed federal funding allots $125 million for nursing education loan repayment. It also grants the nurse faculty loan program a 40 percent increase in funding.

*National League for Nursing; www.nln.org