Elms College to Mark Milestone for Doctor of Nursing Practice Students

CHICOPEE — The Elms College School of Nursing will host a white-coat ceremony on Wednesday, Dec. 16 at 6 p.m. to honor the college’s inaugural class of DNP (doctor of nursing practice) students as they move from the classroom into clinical-practice training. The students, who started in fall 2014, will begin their clinical training in January. The ceremony will be held in Veritas Auditorium in Berchmans Hall.

“This ceremony is a formal acknowledgement that our DNP students are moving into the clinical practice arena and into their advanced nursing specialty courses,” said Teresa Kuta Reske, director of program operations for the DNP program at Elms College.

Added Jean Pelski, director of advanced clinical practice for the DNP program at Elms, “traditionally, the white-coat ceremony has been a rite of passage for medical students to transition into their residency. Now that nurse practitioners are having parity with those professions, we’re doing it as well.”

The DNP degree is a clinical practice doctorate in an advanced specialty of nursing practice. Our DNP graduates will be eligible to sit for advanced certification and licensure in one of two specialty tracks: family nurse practitioner or adult-gerontology acute-care nurse practitioner.

“In keeping with our mission and vision to serve our community by educating professional nurses, the Elms College DNP program addresses the growing need for advanced practice nurses in adult and family care as the population ages and the demand for primary care continues to grow,” said Kathleen Scoble, dean of the School of Nursing.

Program enrollee Lisa Brosnan, who works at Baystate Medical Center, noted that “the face of healthcare is changing, and by taking that leap and becoming a doctoral-prepared nurse, I hope to be at the forefront of this change.”

Most local programs are educating advanced-practice nurses at the master’s level, but Elms College educates them at the doctorate level, Reske pointed out. The college has partnered with local hospital systems — Baystate Medical System and Berkshire Health Systems — to fund cohorts of nurses from those institutions to fill critical roles now and into the future.

“This is a significant collaboration,” Scoble said. “These hospital systems are making an important investment in the health of our communities.”

Added Reske, “these healthcare institutions have enough confidence in Elms College that they have fully funded two cohorts of their employees who are students in this class and in our newest class, the class of 2018. Our students bring a wealth of skills and experience from ambulatory practice, home care, emergency practice, and inpatient care areas.”