The imbalance between practicing registered nurses and the healthcare need in both rural and urban areas points to community colleges and universities continuing efforts at nursing student recruitment.  The lack of nurses practicing at the bedside regionally and nationally is a public health concern.  An innovative means to address this concern was to develop a project for a community health student to create a Nursing Career Day and implement the camp to attract more high school students to nursing in our area.

From this regional public health concern, the state of Illinois approved Southern Illinois University Carbondale to offer a baccalaureate nursing program with their first traditional four-year track beginning in Fall 2020.  Soon after, an accelerated track comprised of 3 semesters started.  The traditional BSN track offered a Level 3 community health nursing course called, Population Centered Healthcare the spring semester prior to graduation with the ABSN track taking this course in the summer prior to their graduation.  The way the community health courses were offered set up an optimal situation for the Traditional BSN students to develop a Nursing Career Day and the ABSN students to take the plan for each day and implement it to area high school students.

In planning this pilot Nursing Career Camp, SIUC nursing faculty targeted as participants area high school students who had attended a health occupations course, a certified nursing assistant course or had a special interest in nursing.  The faculty placed a cap on attendees of 30 to keep the group small and provide a more specialized experience.  The camp was also designed as a daylong camp with a morning session running 9am-12pm and an afternoon session running 12:30pm—3:30pm.  Flyers were distributed to area high schools with a QR code for registration.  For this pilot run, the camp was offered for free, and funds were obtained from the SIU Foundation.

For the traditional BSN group developing the Nursing Career Day, the students were divided into three groups aligned with the topics for each day of the camp.  The first group was assigned the theme, “The Human Body” for Day 1 of the camp, the second group was assigned, “Careers in Nursing” and the third group was assigned, “Specialties in Nursing”.  The assigned project mirrored a Community Needs Assessment that involved the nursing process that was communicated in a series of posts to the instructor:

Post 1: Assessment Phase, Part 1:  Research what other colleges/universities have done at nursing career camps.  What activities seem to be the most exciting and inspirational to your group?  Collect potential ideas for your day at SIUC’s Nursing Career Camp.  Be creative!

Post 2: Assessment Phase, Part 2:  Assess the problem in our region/nationally/globally with the nursing shortage.  Research reasons why high school students don’t go into nursing as a career.  What barriers exist that prevent some high school students from choosing nursing as a career?  What opportunities exist for high school students to go into nursing as a career?

Post 3: Planning Phase, Part 1:  Set specific goals/objectives for the day.  What do you want to accomplish on the day assigned?

Post 4: Planning Phase, Part 2:  Design activities to meet those goals/objectives.  Be creative and use your resources such as the nursing simulation lab assistant for nursing lab activities, the anatomy/physiology lab on campus, and area resources at the SIUC Health Center, Wellness Center, SIH, Marion VA, SSM, and Heartland Regional Medical Center.

What you plan will be implemented by the ABSN students this summer (about 36 students).  Eighteen ABSN students will run the morning session and eighteen students to run the afternoon session of camp.  Specify what jobs need to be done based on a maximum of 18 people for each session.  What activities will attract high school students to nursing?  Make it fun!!!

Post 5: Planning Phase with Implementation/Evaluation:  Submit the entire plan for the day which includes goals and objectives and times and activities.  Be sure to give any contact names needed to implement the plan.  Consider how you would evaluate the effectiveness of the day?  What questions would you ask to evaluate goals/objectives set for your part of the Career Camp?

Post 5 was given to the ABSN students as a rough draft of the Nursing Career Camp’s activities. The students were asked to continue where the traditional BSN students left off and use resources on campus and in the community to make the camp enjoyable, inspirational and successful at recruiting high school graduates to become nurses.  A faculty member was given the role of facilitator for the event and ABSN students were asked to assign themselves the following roles reporting to the facilitator every week:

Team Leader: This person ensures that the team is cohesive and knows their roles before, during and after the activities. Team Leader will meet with the facilitator via Zoom weekly until the camp is finished

Assistant Team Leader: This person fills in for the Team Leader if this person is unable to make the weekly meeting with the facilitator.  The Assistant Team Leader also meets with the nursing simulation lab assistant in Week 2 & 3 to ensure that supplies are available for the group’s activities and any training is completed for the group to run any simulations.  The nursing simulation lab assistant will be used as a resource only since the team will be running any simulations.

Community/Student Communicator: This person is the point of contact with any speakers or outside agencies involved in the activities.  This person ensures that the schedule is shared with any people, so the activity runs smoothly.  This person oversees the final schedule of events so that everyone understands what is going on and what role they are playing in the session.

Curriculum Chair: This person ensures that activities are aligned with goals/objectives for the day.  This person also develops two questions that can be asked at the end of the day to evaluate participant learning or reflection.

General Assistants: One or two team members assist the Team Leader and/or Assistant Team Leader with planning and communication as needed and in carrying out the activities.  Everyone will be helping but the General Assistants will help to get it done. 

Zoom Meeting 1: Discuss with the faculty facilitator how your group will “own” your activities.  Discuss the objectives for your activities.  Do the activities seem doable?  At this stage, you may change aspects of the plan or come up with replacement activities.  Specific roles need to be assigned within your group.  As a result of your meeting, post the progress you have made, and any other assignments made by the faculty facilitator.

Zoom Meeting 2: Discuss with the faculty facilitator any difficulty you are having with the content or your plan of implementation.  Identify the roles within your group. Also, assign the other students’ specific roles to assist in your activities.  There are 35 ABSN students who will be helping so give them specific jobs.  Let the faculty facilitator know if any other resources are needed.  As a result of this meeting, post the progress you have made, and any other assignments made by the faculty facilitator as well as any feedback from the meeting with the nursing simulation lab assistant.

Zoom Meeting 3: Share with faculty facilitator the finalized plan at your meeting so you can polish the plan or make any small changes to it.   Does everyone have a specific job in implementing the activities?  As a result of your meeting, post the progress you have made, and any other assignments made by the faculty facilitator as well as any feedback from a follow-up meeting with the nursing simulation lab assistant.

Zoom Meeting 4: This is the final meeting with the faculty facilitator to ensure that a solid plan is in place and no further questions need answered.  The Team Leader reports the two questions that the Curriculum Chair developed that might be asked at the end of the day to verify that the participants met objectives for the day.  As a result of your meeting, post the progress you have made, and any other assignments made by the faculty facilitator.

Final Post following the event: The Curriculum Chair needs to post an evaluation of the event.  How did you measure the effectiveness of the activities?  What would you have done differently to be more impactful?  What activities would you advise to repeat again next year?

Twenty-five high school students from 13 different high schools from southern Illinois participated in the event.  Both BSN tracks of students developed several learning activities that kept the camp moving for high school students.  Activities included Kahoot, Jeopardy and charades games, a scavenger hunt and relay races.  Also, high school students were given a tour of the cadaver lab on campus which is utilized for Anatomy & Physiology class (a prerequisite for the nursing program). 

A post-camp survey was given to gauge the experience for future programming.  One limitation of the participant survey was an error that was made in scheduling the camp.  Initially, Nursing Career Camp was scheduled for Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday but it was discovered that Thursday was a federal holiday and campus would be closed.  So, the last day of camp was rescheduled for a Friday so, on the last day, only 14 of the 25 students were available to finish the camp and take the survey.  The results were overwhelmingly positive about the camp (Table 1). 

Table 1: Nursing career camp participant survey results.