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Young healthcare colleagues walking and talking at hospital corridor
Nursing can be a thankless job—12-hour shifts, cranky patients and less-than-desirable duties we’d rather not put in print. But then there are the countless rewards that go unmentioned.
“You have the best vantage point to make such a difference,” said Joy Pennington, an executive nurse and academic officer with the Kentucky Board of Nursing (KBN). “It’s not just about going in and starting an IV. It’s about showing [patients] care and compassion, a smile and the understanding that you truly do care about them, and that can make all the difference in the world for the family and for the patient. That is an amazing position to be in, as a nurse, to make such a difference.”
Kentucky colleges and universities operated 121 nursing programs, where students can attain these degrees: doctor of nursing practice (DNP), master of science in nursing (MSN), baccalaureate degree in nursing (BSN), associate degree in nursing (ASN) and practical nursing diploma (PN).
Kelly Jenkins, KBN’s executive director, said the board’s job is to ensure Kentucky’s colleges and universities produce qualified nurses to continue making that difference.
“Kentucky does the best, from my board of nursing employees all the way through all of our programs and the faculty,” Jenkins said. “We have some excellent schools out there.”
Once they have completed a nursing degree, graduates must pass the National Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX).
On average, Kentucky’s nursing programs either have met or exceeded the national average for first-time test takers.
Pennington credited the programs’ faculty.
“They really get involved with the students on a holistic level, and I think that a lot of your faculty invest heart and soul into those students,” she said. “They know that these individuals are going to take care of them or their family one day, and they take that very seriously.”
Jenkins agreed.
“You can’t have good students who can successfully pass the NCLEX without the great faculty that we have been blessed to have here in Kentucky,” she said. “It’s definitely a calling, because sometimes their students get out of school and they go to a hospital and they make more money from day one than our faculty who taught them how to become a nurse.”
A program occasionally may struggle to reach the board’s NCLEX performance benchmark of 80 percent pass rate, but Pennington said that’s when the board comes in with a proactive approach.
“We’ve changed all of our workshops … that literally show them exactly what we’re looking for and how to do it, and we even give them examples,” Pennington said. “We don’t leave them in the wind to just guess because how can a program succeed if you’re constantly struggling to figure out what to do to make that happen?”
The approach is making a difference. Since 2020, Kentucky’s NCLEX pass rate has ranged from 87.7 percent to 89.6 percent.
For a comprehensive look at all of the Commonwealth’s nursing programs, visit the Kentucky Board of Nursing’s website, kbn.ky.gov.