Improving outcomes
New FLC nursing program seeks to address shortage in rural areas

Liz Hatch just started her nursing studies as a junior at Fort Lewis College.  From Los Alamos, N.M., she spent her freshman and sophomore years completing prerequisites like anatomy, biology and chemistry. Now, she’s learning how to take blood pressure, temperature and heart rate in the first semester in the college’s new $2.3 million nursing program.

She’s one of about two dozen students in the new program, which started this fall. Upon completion, they will earn a bachelor’s in nursing through a joint-degree program with the University of Colorado Anschutz.

“I had my sights set on the nursing program … Now we are learning skills that we’ve been waiting to learn  and getting to play nurse every day,” she said during an interview from her on-campus dorm room. 

The program is linked to CU’s Anschutz program, which is about 10 times larger. Amy Barton, a nurse, professor and chair of rural health nursing with CU Anschutz, helped form the link between the two campuses.

“We have the strengths of Fort Lewis College, which really does a phenomenal job of supporting their students – and the top baccalaureate program in the state that’s already accredited and has a very strong program,” said Barton. “Combine those together, and we’re hoping for amazing outcomes to support the workforce in the future.”

According to the Health Resources and Services Administration, there was a shortage of 78,610 full-time RNs in 2025 and a projected shortage of 63,720 by 2030. Anticipating this future shortage, the program aims to lessen impacts on rural areas, which tend to be hit harder than their urban counterparts. “A lot of the nursing shortage is a distribution issue, with more nurses kind of concentrated in urban settings as opposed to in rural hospitals,” said Barton. “That’s also a pattern that occurs throughout the United States.”

The program has two full-time faculty members working alongside director Maggie LaRose, who pointed out some of the program’s features. Those include learning opportunities that can happen on one campus and benefit students on the other. “We have a project called SIM capture, that allows for the recording and broadcasting of simulation so the students have the potential to learn simultaneously from each other across the state.”

That could look like students checking blood pressure and lungs on a mannequin at FLC, while students at CU Anschutz watch the student on a screen, or the reverse.

Hatch has been using the life-like mannequins for practice during lab time.

“They speak, they can moan, they can breathe, give you all the vital signs,” said Hatch. “I’m trying to, as our professors say, suspend disbelief and walk in and just have an open mind. It’s a mannequin, but also you need to view it as a patient. Just having the technology that we have is so cool. It makes it feel as human as possible.”

During a recent visit, LaRose pointed out rooms set up to simulate environments where nurses might find themselves: one looks like a homey living room with a couch, shelves and homey touches; another is set up like a hospital room: stark, with white linens on metal beds upon which the mannequins rest until activated. Students show up in the scrubs they might wear on duty. 

A mannequin dressed in a hospital gown lay on a bed. When prompted from a computer by an instructor, it can make sounds of distress in a real-life type scenario. Instructors can make things more complicated by changing the mannequin’s vital signs or using a mannequin representing a different age to see how students adjust their efforts depending on specific needs. 

“We could potentially have a kid with asthma and an 82-year-old man with COPD,” LaRose said. “So they’re thinking, ‘OK, these are both respiratory, but how different is it when it’s a pediatric patient? How different is it when it’s acute than someone who’s chronic and older?’ A lot of scenarios allow us to personalize the experience.” 

She pointed out a room where the instructors can tweak the responses of the mannequins to see if the nurses will come up with the right intervention. 

“Here is where we can manipulate all of the things,” said LaRose, standing in a small, dark room with a two-way mirror from which to watch the students. “We could change the pulse rate – would they have just given a blood pressure medication? So then, a little later, we can see the blood pressure go down. So this is what it looks like behind the scenes … It’s meant (for) students to make decisions ... If the students go a little off track, we can manipulate and make some changes. It’s essentially meant to be a learning tool.”

LaRose said after the two years of prep courses, students have to complete about 800 hours practicing both in health care facilities, like hospitals and mental health clinics, as well as in the simulation labs on campus. 

The program has room for 24 students and is just one or two spots short. It takes five semesters to complete, and after that, they hope students will stay in rural areas rather than be snatched up by bigger cities or get burned out. 

“We’ve been doing a lot of pipelining,” LaRose said, “recruiting from local high schools for people who want to be nurses and stay and work in this community.”

That’s what Hatch said she’s planning on doing – she said she might want to become an ER nurse. After earning about $15,000 in scholarships and being cheered on by her older sister, younger brother and 2-year-old half-sister, she hopes to work in a rural setting rather than a large city. 

“The city scene? Um, a little too populated for my taste,” she said. “Here in Durango, it truly does feel like home. It just has a community feel that big cities don’t have.”

For more from Colorado Public Radio, go to: www.cpr.org.