some more bad news for northern NB:
UNB Phases Out Nursing Program in Bathurst
(abridged - read full story at
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-br...urst-1.2531733)
The University of New Brunswick is phasing out the nursing program it offers in Bathurst.
Students were told Monday that no more applications would be accepted and the 2017 graduating class will be the program's last one.
Waugh says the students were told UNB couldn't afford to keep the nursing campus at Bathurst going and would concentrate on the programs in Moncton and Fredericton.
"They don't have enough resources to finance all of the campuses and that the resources would be better met in Fredericton or Moncton," she said. "They're allocating their resources there.
"There's not as high enrolment up here in Bathurst, therefore the money is going towards other campuses."
One of the considerations was the difficulty placing Bathurst students in a clinical setting for experience, as the program was competing for spots with University of Moncton students and community college nursing programs.
Storr said the Bathurst program also had difficulty attracting qualified applicants. Also, applicants who weren't accepted into the more popular nursing programs in Fredericton and Moncton were hesitant to go Bathurst, she said.
A third consideration was Vitalité Health Authority wanted bilingual nurses to work in Chaleur Regional Hospital in Bathurst.
"The language requirements for the Chaleur General are such that our students are having challenges and Vitalité wanted our students to be able to comprehend French for the safety of the patients," said Storr.
"The northern part of the province will definitely see some backlash from this decision. They do have nursing students from the University of Moncton, but they are a French program and we are an English program — the only English program up here. So we cover a lot of programs that are English-based."
I think the move to a two health care region model for the province, with the Chaleur Hospital being included in the francophone Vitalite network was the kiss of death for this program. It was pretty incongruous having an English language nursing program affiliated with a francophone hospital. The UNB Bathurst nursing program was always the weak sister to the programs in Fredericton and Moncton. If there was a program to be cut, this would be it. The French language requirement at Vitalite was the coup de grace…..