Aspiring Nurses Sign On At WVU Medicine Reynolds Memorial

GLEN DALE - The benefits of WVU Medicine's Aspiring Nurses Program stretches beyond the obvious - the local nursing students who now receive needed financial breathing room as they work toward their degree. Officials from both WVU Medicine and West Virginia Northern Community College said the program is a great local partnership that strengthens the Ohio Valley community.

Six WVNCC nursing students - Lacie Gilmore, Jasmine Johnson, Madison Lancaster, Shayla Sias, Allison Spears and Shayla Toppeto - put pen to paper at WVU Medicine Reynolds Memorial Hospital on Thursday. The program gives those selected students $5,000 per semester for four semesters of schooling, plus another $5,000 upon completion. In return, the students sign on to work for three years with WVU Medicine Reynolds Memorial.

A similar signing day was held earlier this week at Wheeling University for students at Belmont College.

WVNCC President Daniel Mosser said it is crucial that local colleges like his and Belmont work with industries like nursing and organizations like WVU Medicine.

"Ultimately, our students are going to go work for these businesses," Mosser said. "So it's a partnership. It's a handoff between the school and the business in terms of the skills that we're developing in these people and the skills that the employers need them to exhibit once they leave school and go to work for the business.

"So it is a codependent relationship between the industries and the college in terms of delivering the kinds of people with the kinds of skills the businesses need," he added.

Douglass Harrison, president and CEO of WVU Medicine Wheeling and Reynolds Memorial hospitals, said local partnerships like this are critical to his hospitals' success. WVU's nursing program itself couldn't produce enough nurses to meet the needs in the state's hospitals, he said. The nursing profession is still trying to rebound after so many left the job during and after the COVID-19 pandemic, and Harrison said programs like the Aspiring Nurses Program will help fill those gaps with students from within their respective communities.

"We've got to continue to build relationships to create a pipeline of folks wanting to join WVU Medicine," he said. "If you look around the state, West Virginia has one of the lowest reported rates of people wanting to work. So if you can start that process early, and show them a career path, that's extremely important."

The program also knocks down some of the biggest barriers students face in achieving their educational goals. Hospital officials mentioned that financial strains often lead students to abandoning their education. The money provided with this program can help the six students signing Thursday to meet everyday needs.

Johnson said she's a non-traditional student, who already had gone to school to become a certified occupational therapist assistant. She served in that role for about six years and wanted to pivot to nursing, but she had exhausted all her student loans. The money from the Aspiring Nurses Program will allow her to help pay for school.

"This program is a gamechanger," she said. "It really is a relief, and I'm forever grateful for it."