Ocean County’s next generation of nurses surrounded a hospital bed at Ocean County College on Thursday and explored what will be their new classroom for the coming school year.
These high school students, enrolled in a pre-nursing program at Ocean County Vocational Technical School, are completing a two-year program that aims to prepare them for careers in health care. On Thursday, the students, college leaders and Vo-Tech administrators celebrated the opening of the program’s new training classrooms on the college’s Toms River campus.
Nurses are critical here in Ocean County, where 23% of county residents are 65 or older, according to the U.S. Census. Additionally, the county has three hospitals and 32 nursing homes registered with the New Jersey Department of Health.
“There is such a need, for every level of health care,” said ToniAnn Ravalli, a pre-nursing instructor at Ocean County Vocational Technical School. “Especially after COVID, there was definitely a mass exodus, of not just nurses, but health care employees at all levels.”
In 2021, about 100,000 nurses left the profession, according to a study published in the journal Health Affairs.
“We need nurses,” said Ravalli. “We need LPNs (licensed practical nurses). We need RNs (registered nurses). … We need nurses, because people are never going to stop getting sick. People are never going to stop getting injured, unfortunately.”
County elected officials hope the pre-nursing program’s new, expanded location at Ocean County College will help more students enter nursing and ease the shortage, at least locally.
State Sen. Robert Singer said the program’s new facility will help to ease a massive waiting list of more than 500 students who want to attend the vo-tech’s different career programs.
“Young people need to have opportunities, need to have choices, to be successful in this world,” he said.
Students enter the two-year pre-nursing program in their junior or senior year of high school. Once finished, they can take the Certified Nursing Assistant exam and begin working or continue their education and seek a higher-level nursing degree.
“The majority of my students, when they leave, they are going to nursing school,” said Ravalli. “This definitely prepares them for what nursing school is like.”
The students will learn CPR, to bathe and dress patients, and study wound care and first aid, the pre-nursing instructor said. The new space at Ocean County College will also allow the trainees to glimpse some higher-level nursing skills, Ravalli said.
“Instead of just focusing on Certified Nursing Assistant skills, (with) this lab and our location here (at Ocean County College), we’re able to elevate the curriculum,” she said.
The nursing shortages that have continued since the COVID-19 pandemic are expected to get worse over the next decade as baby boomers age. By 2032, New Jersey is projected to have 12% shortage of registered nurses to job openings, according to the American Association of Colleges of Nursing.
Ocean County Commissioner Frank Sadeghi said the pre-nursing program will help to prepare Ocean County’s young workers for an increasingly competitive job market, while also fulfilling an important need for older residents.
“We’re creating future opportunities for our students,” he said.
Like her students, Ravalli also started her career by attending a pre-nursing program while in high school.
“Now I get to come back and teach the very program that launched my career,” she said. “So it’s very full circle for me.”
This story originally appeared Sept. 16, 2024 in the Asbury Park Press.
