State Nursing Committee Recommends One-Year Suspension of Operations for Hartnell College Nursing Program

The California Board of Registered Nursing licensing committee at a hearing on Thursday recommended that the Hartnell College nursing program, which had been "moving toward a partnership" with Salinas Valley Memorial Hospital, be suspended for one year for "reorganization" due to its failure to comply with a "handful" of the board's standards, the Monterey County Herald reports. An inspection in May found that the school was in noncompliance with the licensing board's rules regarding student pass rates, administrative leadership and staffing levels. The full nursing board is scheduled to hear the matter in September, when it could elect to close the program. If the Hartnell nursing program is suspended, students who had planned to attend the school in the fall 2004 semester would be offered scholarships to attend the school next year. Hartnell President Ed Valeau said the school has already begun addressing some of the issues detailed in the report, adding that Hartnell will not accept new students in the fall. According to Valeau, "We anticipated these changes and had already made changes in concert with our colleagues." Salinas CEO Sam Downing said the hospital has agreed to provide two instructors for Hartnell and that it has recently hired 20 graduating nurses from the program. Downing and Valeau said that on Wednesday they will announce a plan that could "[p]ut the hospital in charge of the nursing program," the Herald reports. "We'll be highlighting how we want to work and build a stronger relationship with Hartnell College," Downing said. However, neither Downing nor Valeau would comment on details of the arrangement (Cabrera, Monterey County Herald, 7/24).