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behavior of college students. This year, Professor Betty Rambur was appointed a commissioner on the Medicare Payment Advisory Commission that advises the U.S. Congress on Medicare policy. “We now have an impact that is national and international,” Wolfe said. Wolfe and others credit the college’s success to a long history of strong leadership and investment in the college by the University and the state. They say the influence of the college’s first director Louisa White carries to this day. As a member of the State Committee on Nursing Education in 1943 White advocated for a nursing program teaching more than direct patient care. In a move almost unheard of at the time, she outlined a curriculum with a liberal arts component leading to a bachelor of science degree. By 1946, White found herself as director of the program housed within the School of Home Economics. A three-part curriculum consisted of academic study, pre-clinical experience at a hospital and clinical study. “She had the vision, the wisdom, the courage and the tenacity to move this agenda forward and establish a nursing program in a university environment,” Wolfe said of White. The program rapidly took steps to establish itself and, by 1957, new director Martha Sayles set in motion college accreditation. The next year, two men joined the class ranks. On July 1, 1961 the School of Nursing became the College of Nursing as part of the now named University of Rhode Island.

In 1977, the program moved from cramped quarters in Fogarty Hall to a new 29,186-square-foot facility named White Hall after its inaugural director. In 1985, a doctoral program was launched vaulting the college firmly into the research and policy sphere. Over the ensuing decades the number of college faculty expanded to 35 and with them research grants totaling $30 million during the last four decades. In the last few years alone, besides opening the Nursing Education Center, the college launched an online program for registered nurses to obtain a bachelor’s degree and in 2016 joined the University’s Academic Health Collaborative to forge collaboration among the colleges of Nursing, Pharmacy, and Health Sciences. Since then the college’s national rankings have climbed steadily. “I just can’t imagine the University and college ever being stagnant and not responding to what’s happening nationally and locally in the health care delivery system,” Viau-Hann said. Naturally, students keep flocking to the college due to its national recognition, and undergraduate applications have soared in recent years. And through the Pathways program the college works to bolster the number of students from diverse backgrounds and about 13 percent of its undergraduate students hail from historically underrepresented populations. “We have been able to really grow our impact,” Wolfe said. “Over the years certainly we’ve remained committed to the education of Rhode Islanders, but the program has grown in visibility.”

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