In May, the school's Family Nurse Practitioner program was fully accredited by the Board of Nurse Examiners for the State of Texas. The first courses in the program were offered in the summer of 1995, and it had operated under an initial accreditation since September 1996. Even under the initial accreditation, all the graduates have passed the national certification exam, said Bonnet, the former dean. Students at the nursing school can earn a bachelor's degree and a master's degree. The Family Nurse Practitioner designation is part of the master's program.
Tiller hopes to spread the word about the master's level courses at the school.
She also believes a lot of registered nurses in the Abilene area could benefit from completing work for a bachelor's degree in nursing, a process that would take about a year. The market for nurses is good right now, Tiller said, and full classes of 50 undergraduate and 10 graduate students have enrolled for the fall semester. Tiller hopes to eventually expand the teaching faculty from eight to 12 members so that more students can be accommodated. Also coming up for Tiller will be planning a 20th anniversary celebration for the school. It opened in July 1979 and added the master's program in June 1993 and the Family Nurse Practitioner program in 1995.