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Drury University and Cox College signed an agreement Friday to offer a new dual enrollment program between the schools. The new program gives students the opportunity to earn a liberal arts degree from Drury and a professional nursing degree from Cox at the same time. KSMU’s Adam Murphy reports.
At the press conference to announce the new program, Dr. Anne Brett, president of Cox College, said the agreement means new opportunities for both schools.
“The dual degree program will educate students that neither Drury University nor Cox College would attract alone,” she said.
Drury and Cox have created this agreement to serve the desires of prospective students, and to address the need for more health professionals.
Brett said she hears concerns from prospective Cox College students that they want a campus on which to live and experience a university life, and Drury University’s president Todd Parnell said Drury sees a lot of interest in nursing careers from prospective students. Both of them said they believe that this dual enrollment program will attract these students by now offering a professional nursing degree integrated with a liberal arts education and all the amenities and opportunities of Drury University’s campus, such as housing, athletics, and greek life.
“They will get the traditional liberal arts base which I’d like to of as critical thinking and problem solving. All the things that put you in a place to survive in a world, an economy that we don’t know what it’s going to look like five years from now, and then they get the professional track,” said Parnell.
Another goal of this program is to address the need for more healthcare professionals. Brett said she hopes that this program will attract recent high school graduates, and help to lower the average age of nurses entering the field, so they can serve for longer periods of time. Parnell said he hopes the program will motivate more educated young professionals to stay in the area and serve local needs.
Drury University will soon begin recruiting students to start the dual enrolment program in fall 2010. For KSMU News, I’m Adam Murphy.