Evaluating Innovations in Nursing Education: Call for Proposals

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Evaluating Innovations in Nursing Education
Call for Proposals

• Applicant Web Conference
• November 21, 2008

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RWJFs Mission

• The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation is committed
  to improving the health and health care of all
  Americans.

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RWJFs Human Capital Portfolio

• The Human Capital portfolio is based on the
  Foundation's longstanding recognition that
  strategies for social change do not succeed
  without the leaders and workforce to develop and
  carry forward the ideas.

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RWJFs Nursing Strategy

• Reverse the nurse and nurse faculty shortages
• Promote the link between nursing care and high
  quality health outcomes
• Develop the next generation of nurse leaders
• Investigate nursing solutions for a more
  effective health and health care system

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• Evaluating Innovations in Nursing Education

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Overview of Presentation

• Program Goals and Rationale
• Eligibility of Interventions
• Application Process
• Selection Criteria
• Key Dates
• Contacts
• Demonstration of Grantmaking Online (GO)

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Program Goals

• Evaluate interventions aimed at expanding
  teaching capacity or promoting faculty
  recruitment and retention in nursing schools
• Disseminate evidence to foster replication of
  successful strategies throughout the country and
  increase the number of nursing school graduates
• Assemble national benchmark measures of key
  variables associated with the faculty shortage to
  assist schools in comparing their progress to
  national norms

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Rationale for the Program

• The nursing shortage is intensifying as nursing
  schools turn away thousands of qualified
  applicants due to insufficient numbers of faculty
  to teach them.
• The faculty shortage has been attributed to heavy
  workload, low wages, high average age, and lack
  of an adequate pipeline.
• Educational capacity is also constrained by
  limited numbers of clinical education sites.

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Rationale for the Program

• By expanding teaching productivity and/or
  promoting faculty recruitment and retention,
  interventions will contribute to increasing the
  numbers of graduated nurses.
• Promising interventions that foster these
  outcomes are ongoing and merit evaluation.
• Effective action to address the faculty shortage
  will require evidence.
• We seek to generate that evidence.

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Eligibility of Interventions

• Interventions must be
• Ongoing
• Show promise to increase teaching capacity,
  improve faculty work-life, and/or promote faculty
  recruitment and retention
• Implemented on a large enough scale so that the
  numbers of affected faculty and students will be
  sufficient to detect the impact on important
  outcomes
• Innovative

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Eligibility of Interventions

• Examples of Interventions
• Preparation and employment of new types of
  instructors (e.g., practicing nurses taking on
  new roles)
• Collaborations with hospitals and other delivery
  organizations that foster new ways of integrating
  clinical and didactic education
• Use of new instructional technology for large
  segments of the education program

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Eligibility of Interventions

• Examples of Interventions
• Faculty development programs for improving
  faculty work-life and satisfaction
• Policy changes that create incentives for
  expanding teaching productivity or enhancing
  faculty recruitment and retention

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Application Process

• Applicant organization nursing school or health
  care organization responsible for administering
  the intervention with a subcontract to outside
  evaluator
• Brief Proposal
• Pre-funding assistance in refining evaluation
  design
• Full Proposal
• Site Visits (via video-conference)
• Funding decision (start date December 1, 2009)

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Application Process

• Brief proposal due by January 23, 2009
• Description of intervention and how it will
  affect required outcomes
• Existing evidence of effectiveness
• Plans for implementing controlled evaluation
• Commitment of key stakeholders
• Qualifications of the evaluation partner
• Preliminary budget (up to 2 years, up to
  300,000)

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Selection Criteria

• Compelling intervention that can be replicated
• Evidence of its effectiveness
• Logic underlying expectations that it will
  achieve its intended outcomes
• Plans for documenting critical elements of the
  intervention as well as identifying strategies
  for addressing challenges to implementation

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Selection Criteria

• Controlled Evaluation Design
• Ability to isolate the impact of the intervention
  (e.g., pre- and post measures, comparison group
  or randomized plan)
• Capacity to account for the effects of likely
  confounding variables
• Identification of appropriate comparison groups
  (if applicable) and assurance of participation

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Selection Criteria

• Evaluation Design continued
• Scale of implementation affords adequate numbers
  of subjects (e.g., faculty, students) to permit
  isolation of meaningful effects on outcomes
  (e.g., adequate statistical power)
• Selection of appropriate outcomes for measuring
  success and access to necessary data for
  measuring them
• Commitment to collect appropriate outcome data 5
  years beyond implementation of the evaluation

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Selection Criteria

• Outcome measures from each of three domains
• Teaching Productivity (e.g., number of graduated
  nurses per faculty FTE of students accepted
  of available clinical spaces)
• Faculty Work-life (e.g., faculty retention
  intent to leave faculty faculty satisfaction
  faculty stress salary comparison with similarly
  prepared nurses in other settings)
• Quality of Education (e.g., rates of first-time
  passage of NCLEX)

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Key Dates

• January 23, 2009 Deadline for receipt of brief
  proposals
• March 13 May 1, 2009Technical assistance and
  self-study for selected applicants
• May 1, 2009Invitation to submit full proposal
  for applicants who have completed self-study
• June 12, 2009Deadline for receipt of full
  proposals

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Key Dates

• July 27August 28, 2009Site visits via video
  conference with selected applicants
• November 2009Notification of awards
• December 1, 2009Start of grants

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Contacts

• Website
• www.EvaluatingInnovationsInNursing.org
• Email
• info_at_EvaluatingInnovationsInNursing.org
• Phone
• [phone]

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Contacts

• Mail
• Michael Yedidia, Ph.D., Program Director
• Manisha Agrawal, M.P.H., Research Analyst
• Center for State Health Policy
• Rutgers University
• 55 Commercial Avenue, 3rd Floor
  
• New Brunswick, NJ 08901
•