GW Nursing’s mission as a premier school of nursing for education in health policy provides both students and nurses with a growing array of resources and learning opportunities, many of which will be provided through the new GW Nursing Center for Health Policy and Media Engagement.
One such opportunity, a yearlong graduate certificate option in health policy and media engagement, will launch in August 2017 under the leadership of Professor Mary Jean Schumann. She describes the five-course (15-credit) online program as “a focused, high-powered journey through the underpinnings of the political, executive and judicial processes and strategies essential to effective regulatory and legislative implementation.”
Dr. Schumann says the program will include frequent experiential learning activities as students engage in the process of shaping policy with local, state and federal decision-makers. The courses will allow students to use a variety of tools and tactics as they explore and apply the health care financing and reimbursement principles and strategies to health care policy solutions. Students will also identify and analyze health problems, using these analyses to both create and shepherd policy solutions through actual or virtual policymaking processes in legislatures, regulatory environments or within the justice system.
“Over the next decade, this and other academic offerings will increase the capacity and confidence of GW-educated nurses to take increasingly visible and critical roles in shaping and leading critical policy changes,” Dr. Schumann says.