“A bill to provide for a wage differential program to support new nursing school faculty members.”
No CRS summary available for this bill.
This section revises the Nurse Faculty Loan Program (NFLP)—under which the Secretary of Health and Human Services enters into agreements with accredited schools of nursing to establish student loan funds for nursing students who agree to serve as nurse faculty—to authorize the Secretary also to award nurse faculty grants and makes conforming technical and structural changes to program provisions. The section further establishes a nurse faculty demonstration program (new subsection (c)) under which eligible schools of nursing may receive grants, for up to three years, to supplement salaries of eligible nursing faculty members in an amount equal to the difference between (1) the average salary of nurses in clinical practice (based on school-submitted data or local averages, adjusted for inflation and broken down by credentials, experience, and education) and (2) the greater of the individual faculty member's salary or the average salary for faculty with similar credentials and education at the school. To be eligible, a school of nursing must submit an application including salary history or local data, average faculty salaries, current and projected faculty vacancies over five years, and plans for sustaining supplemented salaries post-grant; grants must be used entirely for salary supplementation, with the school maintaining the faculty member's base salary at the required level. In awarding grants, the Secretary must ensure equitable geographic distribution and give priority to schools demonstrating greatest need (e.g., financial circumstances, faculty vacancies, planned student training), service to vulnerable populations (e.g., in health professional shortage areas), and other specified factors.