By 2030, New Jersey will have the third largest nurse shortage in the country – a shortage of more than 11,000 nurses. This according to the US Health Resources and Services Administration.
It appears that statistically, because of the recession, nurses were putting off retirement and stayed in the workforce a little longer. Now with the uptick in the economy, nurses are beginning to retire. The problem is not that new nurses are unavailable, but that the nursing schools are understaffed. The shortage of appropriate skilled teachers across the country means the nursing schools are not able to take in as many students as are applying.
According to Professor Dr. Nadine Aktan, nursing schools are turning away qualified applicants in droves because of the faculty shortage. The American Association of Colleges of Nurses says that in 2017 more than 56,000 qualified applicants were turned away from undergraduate nursing programs across the country.
