I was surprised at the low number. Still, the presence of nursing schools in most states with no waiting list suggests that many students are choosing to wait to get into a preferred school. But that just changes the question; why don't the busier schools expand capacity? It can't be done overnight, but we have been hearing about this crisis for years. There appears to be a shortage of nursing faculty, especially for "positions requiring or preferring a doctoral degree." A bottleneck in schools makes it hard to produce more qualified instructors, but the deeper cause is compensation: According to the American Academy of Nurse Practitioners, the average salary of a nurse practitioner, across settings and specialties, is $94,050. By contrast, AACN reported in March 2013 that master's prepared faculty earned an annual average salary of $80,690. It's still hard to figure. The schools are refusing to admit new students, thereby declining additional revenue, which could be used to attract professors.Higher compensation in clinical and private-sector settings is luring current and potential nurse educators away from teaching.
This is interesting, b_b. A white paper on the faculty shortage points out that It had not occurred to me that there would be a legal limit. Elsewhere I read that states typically limit the ratio to 10 or 12 students per instructor. Not so hard to figure now. With a legal cap on the amount of revenue an additional class can bring in, the schools have little incentive to respond to the demand of the aspiring nursing students. Wait, maybe the government figured supply-and-demand would do its thing and schools would simply raise tuition to allow them to attract more professors with higher salaries, and students would happily pay a market rate for the guaranteed 10% of an instructor's attention. Then again, maybe not.It's still hard to figure. The schools are refusing to admit new students, thereby declining additional revenue, which could be used to attract professors.
Several states allow instructor-to-student ratio of 1:12 in clinical courses utilizing qualified preceptors, thereby expanding faculty capacity. Other states allow a 1:20 ratio (Delaware) or 1:25 (Texas) for precepted courses.