Healthcare is one of the most challenging fields due to the issues surrounding it. As a result, the entire health care system resonates with change and the roles of nurses in executing these changes are expanding and changing with time. Perhaps it is important to understand the roles nurses perform in improving the state of the entire health system. That being said, nursing has had an obligation of improving the educational training for practice. As admission into nursing courses expanded with the introduction of associate degree as well as the expansion of community colleges, that agenda was adjusted to include the need to align and differentiate between levels of practice (Ellis & Hartley, 2004). However, an increasing number of nurses are going back to school to complete baccalaureate degree as this provides them with an avenue to seek advancement or transition to new roles in nursing. Therefore, the last two decades has seen the number of nurses who had initially learned their trade through diploma and the associate degree in nursing programs, graduate with baccalaureate nursing degree. In fact, their numbers have doubled …show more content…
In 2009, a unit within Veterans Association that often deals with programs and incentives, suggested and later made it a requirement that nurses who harbored the ambition of extending their careers beyond Nurse Level 1 were required to arm themselves with a Baccalaureate degree. To show its commitment towards improving the competency of retired nurses whose highest level of education was an associate degree or a diploma, the Veteran Association embarked on a 5-year program to assist this group of nurses to obtain baccalaureate degrees at a cost of $50 million (Black,