Bill Klaproth (Host): This is today in Nursing Leadership, a podcast from the American Organization for Nursing Leadership. I'm Bill Klaproth. And with me is Denise White, President, Atrium Health Union, and Missy Baker, CNO, Atrium Health Union, Union West, and Anson, as we talk about creating the workforce of the future through an innovative community partnership. Denise and Missy, welcome.

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: Good morning. Thank you for giving us the opportunity to be here today, Bill.

Host: You bet.

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: Great to meet you, Bill. Thanks for having us.

Host: Yeah, Denise and Missy, thank you so much. Good to talk with you. So Denise, let me start with you. Can you share the genesis story of the Healthcare Sciences Academy and when it started?

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: Absolutely. This partnership started in 2017. We were approached by Union County Public Schools. They were really looking at an opportunity for one of their school clusters. They had some performance challenges. Also, it was a school cluster that very low socioeconomic status. Really, the kids in that cluster didn't really see any opportunities outside of high school. And they really wanted to figure out a way to reimagine that cluster and look at opportunities to give the kids opportunities to grow.

And one of the important things that we know is that there's a huge demand for healthcare workers. So, the superintendent of education approached us and said, "How about let's partner and let's take this cluster and really make it a health sciences cluster? Let's start work around introducing health sciences to kids early on and really finding a way to maybe engage." It's kind of a twofold. They wanted to improve the performance of the school, one thing. But they also wanted to figure out how to enhance the kids' life, which I think is very important. So, really giving us the opportunity to say, "Let's look at how we can partner to reimagine the future of these kids." and also, really, make school interesting.

So, it was a partnership that really gave us the opportunity to focus on health careers and health sciences early on, but also knowing that it's not just about that, it's about other things. It's about math, it's about English, it's about sciences. So, the partnership gave us the ability to really look at how we could work with our public school system to not only help them as it related to enhancing the kids' life. But also, it was a great pipeline for us because we know there's a huge challenge in our world related to healthcare pipeline. And so, these are kids that are going to stay in our community. So, why not grow them from the beginning and give them the opportunities.

Host: Yeah. Great community initiative and good to expose those kids early as you were talking about those different things, for sure. And Missy, so why did you start this? And what sparked this whole initiative?

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: Well, overall in healthcare, you know, the workforce, we have shortages. And so, really looking out, especially in community hospital and rural areas, making sure that you're still able to grow your pipeline. And so, looking back and saying, "How can we impact this community and have these students who we know are going to stay in this community, be a part of our organization?"

And so, we really worked with the school system and overall gave differing abilities, whether it's nursing, whether it's in radiology, whether it's in respiratory. We wanted to make sure that we had that pipeline coming into our community and our facilities, because we know that, through 2030s, the shortage is there. And so, adding these students to our pipeline certainly helps fill our needs.

Host: Yeah. That's, again, a great initiative and a great goal and certainly can reap some benefits, not only for the kids, but for the hospital a nd the community as well. So, Denise, how did this partnership with the school system come together? And what does that collaboration look like so far?

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: Oh, great. Great question. I think, you know, one of the things is it started with an idea, and one of the things we know is that you have to be innovative. You have to think differently. And that's one of the things that our school system really is about, is about innovation. And we as a healthcare system are about innovation. So, the ability to really look at shared goals. You know, we had shared goals.

And one of the key things about Union County Public Schools is they have what they call the portrait of a graduate. So, every graduate from the school system, they want them to do things like be leaders. Be able to problem solve, be able to collaborate, be able to communicate, be able to be really financially good stewards. Really, they want to grow more than just the academic realm of their high school and and their entire school years.

And so, when you think about healthcare as a whole, that's exactly who we want to hire. We want to hire individuals who those same core values. So, it was an easy partnership because we have the same goals. We want the same things and we want the same outcomes. We want individuals who are successful and who have those soft skills and the durable skills to be able to go out and do great things in the world. So, it made it very easy for us to partner with them.

Host: Yeah, for sure. Thank you. Missy, why the decision to target elementary-aged children for this initiative?

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: So, this was really a lesson learned. You know, we really started with our middle school kids. And so, as we started in the middle school, we knew this wasn't early enough And so, we stepped back to say, "All right, how can we help kids earlier when they're making the decisions?" So, we went back to the elementary, starting in kindergarten. So as Denise talked about the leadership qualities and stuff, we start that with our elementary kids. So, we have ambassadors where they still have that leadership doing the right thing, making good choices, and they are help leading these students towards health sciences.

So, we do these classes in elementary school. We partner with two local elementary schools where we have made the Health Sciences Academy. We actually have a classroom where they are able to work on good nutrition, health sciences, talking about careers. We partner. We have people from the hospital come to these schools and actually teach. And so, it's just really been a win-win because students are being educated early on about healthcare careers.

Host: Well, I guess when you introduce this early, they grow up with it. It's just something regular. So, I would imagine it is better to target kids when they are a little bit younger. And then, Missy, could you share some measurable outcomes or success stories that have resulted from this initiative?

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: Absolutely.

Host: I bet you got several of them.

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: And we could sit here all day. So, we've impacted over 2,800 students since 2017. And so, our first graduating class was in 2024. We had 13 graduates. Number one in the school was a Health Sciences Academy student, which is very exciting. Their grade point average is about one point above a non-HSA student, which is fantastic.

Host: That's amazing. Yeah.

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: And this is not just in health sciences. This is reading math, science. This is in all grades. So, core classes. , So we had 12 that were dually enrolled with college classes, earning 145 credits prior to ever graduating. So, nine completed the nurse aid course, which is fantastic. In 2025, it was even more so. Remember, these kids are COVID kids. So this was a time we continued to move forward. And so, in 2025, we had 22 graduates again. Number one in the class was a Health Sciences Academy student. Cumulative grade point average was 3.58. So, still a really strong GPA. Nineteen were dually enrolled in college classes and high school. They had 473 college credits before they ever graduated. And so, really, that saves about $36,000 in tuition.

T he courses with our 2025 graduates, we had 12 that completed the nurse aid course. One who was a medical office assistant, one who did EMT, basic one that did the medical Spanish interpreter, and they earned $869,000 in scholarship. And then, just to go on this year already, we have a student who started in elementary. So she's gone through elementary, middle, and high. And last week, she found out she got a full ride to Chapel Hill for pre-med. She is a first year college generation. So, nobody in her family has ever been to college. So if you want to truly see how our program is impacting your community, just listen to these stories. It's honestly phenomenal.

Host: Yeah. Those are real results.

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: Real results.

Host: Yes. And every kid that you impact is going to go on to impact more kids. So, what you are doing is really compounding. And those are great stats. A great point average. And the story you just told about the girl that you got accepted into college, that's amazing. That's going to really make you both feel really good.

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: And I want to add to that, these students are incredible. It's not just that they're involved and when they get to high school, it's like a Magnet type program. And it's not just HSA. Missy gave you some pretty astounding numbers of that. They're in high school, they're dually enrolled in a junior college. They have a CNA certification. They have all this. But they also do an incredible lot. They're in band, they're in junior ROTC, they're captains of their sports team. So, these are just incredibly well-rounded kids who really make us proud to think that we started this kind of embedding this in elementary school and here they are graduating only two classes to this point. But some pretty incredible outcomes we believe.

Host: Amazing. All right. So, let's flip it—I'm sorry, go ahead.

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: I want to say one more thing. One more thing that I think can't get missed is they want to give back to their community. And we have an event that's called Tickle Pink. And so, this is how we pay for mammograms, gas card services for uninsured and underinsured breast cancer victims.

And so, this past year, our Health Sciences Academy decided they wanted to give back. So, they did a cancer walk and raised over $5,000 to give to the Tickle Pink organization So, it is not about what they do in the four walls of the school or even what they do in the hospital. It's they part of our community.

Host: Yeah. Truly making a community impact. Yeah. So, let's flip the tables. Let's talk about the hospital side of this. Denise, how has this program impacted your organization in terms of workforce development and readiness?

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: Well, that's a great question. And as Missy shared with you some stats about these students have completed their certified nursing assistant training, they've become EMTs. These are individuals that we can hire. We can hire them directly into the pipeline and start the process of really looking at this is workforce. You know, we really want to help them look at the entire strategy because they did not even know what was possible. In their mind. Many of them thought they could only be a doctor or a nurse to be in healthcare.

So by starting early as elementary school, we start talking to them about, "Here's the steps you can take. You may be a CNA first, then you may go to nursing school. Then you may become a respiratory therapist, whatever you choose." Because that certification they receive in high school is that foundational piece of healthcare that they have to start their journey. So, we've hired them. We've hired them into positions in our organization. Right now, we have an apprentice program, so we've hired them into the apprentice program. And so if we can get them in our organization, we can get them into these work fields and kind of seeing things, we found that they want to stay with us.

You know, for me, it's about these are students who typically don't leave our community. So when we've got just two graduating class and we've been able to hire them into the workforce already, you know, the possibilities are really incredible for us when think about just, we are here already.

Also, I think about a part of this is our teammates are incredibly invested in this. You know, they're going into the elementary schools and the middle schools and the high school talking about careers. They're sharing with them about things. They're letting them do fun experiments and things like that. But then, now, they're seeing them come in and work with them. They're their teammates. They're standing shoulder to shoulder with them, caring for our patient's. So, our teammates have a lot of pride in, they played a role in that happening. So, it's just a win-win for everyone.

Host: Absolutely. You're giving them a vision of the future, what they could grow into.

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: Absolutely.

Host: And that's reaping benefits on the hospital system as well.

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: Absolutely

Host: Well, this has been great. Thank you both for this discussion. Last question, Denise. What does the future look like for this?

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: Well, I think for me there's just so many possibilities. You know, we are looking at we're in one school cluster now. So, does that expand to other school clusters? We typically want about 50 students in the academy to go into high school. We have 80 applicants this year. And 12 of them are outside of that cluster. So, it's getting leveraged there within the school system.

Another thing is we were just really given a grant. We're very honored to receive a grant from the Duke Foundation. And we've been given the opportunity to create an academy headquarters at our hospitals. So, we have simulation equipment, being able to really bring the students to the hospital. And that helps us a little bit more. We have classroom space in there. So, we have the ability to work more with the students, more hands on. And our teammates will have more greater opportunity to spend time with them because they're right there on the campus.

We also have been afforded working through the school system some apprenticeship programs, which are paid programs for students that they can work during their high school years and be paid while they're working there through an apprenticeship partnership

So, it is just really looking at how we continue to grow, how we continue to partner with our community college, our Wingate University, South Piedmont Community College, because they're huge partners in this also. They want to be part of the journey And so, those conversations about what's next, you know, how do we get them engaged. They go to the community college, then can go on to Wingate University and really looking at taking this as a community initiative, it's not about Atrium Health. It's not about UCPS, it's about our community making it better for everyone.

So if we can create the pipeline and the workforce of the future internally, and everybody's invested in that and everybody plays a part in that, it creates a lot of community engagement, a lot of pride, and it really is something that I think that could be replicated in other areas. You just have to be willing to take a chance. You have to know that. The journey's going to have some bumps along the way. But you know, do your typical PDSA cycle and figure it out and make it right. And then, you can do some incredible things. So, we're really grateful to the opportunity that we've been able to start this journey. And I think the sky's the limit for where it can go.

Host: Amazing. Well, you've really built a foundation here and it is growing. So, you know that you've already got a foothold. It is successful. So, it's only going to grow from here. And hopefully, other hospitals and health systems and communities can kind of take up the model that you've done.

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: Yeah, absolutely. And I think Denise mentioned it, but just really about the partnership. So we are very fortunate to have a community college and a four-year college within our county. And so, it's about that partnership. And so, it truly makes a difference in our community.

Host: Well, Denise and Missy, thank you for coming by today and sharing this incredible story and great results that you're doing with this community initiative. Thank you again.

Denise White, RNC, MSN, NEA-BC: No, it is our honor to be here and thank you for asking us.

Missy Baker, RN, MSN, NE-BC: Yeah, we appreciate it. Thank you.

Host: Yeah, you bet. Once again, That is Denise White and Missy Baker. And if you found this podcast helpful, please share it on your social channels and check out the full podcast library for topics of interest to you at aonl.org/nursing-leadership-podcast. This is Today in Nursing Leadership. Thanks for listening.