Tufts Health Plan Foundation in Watertown, Mass. has been chosen as one of 19 foundations nationwide to receive funding from Partners Investing in Nursing’s Future, a national initiative to help address the long-term shortage of nurses across the country.

To develop solutions and lead efforts within Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and New Hampshire, the foundation has been awarded a two-year grant of $250,000 to support an extensive collaboration in the three states that will develop a regional approach to nursing education.

Rhode Island nurse leaders from academic and practice settings across the state will participate in this three-state collaboration, “Creativity and Connections: Building a Regional Nursing Education Framework.” This project will leverage a broader nursing education community to increase the numbers and diversity of nursing faculty through scholarship support; increase nursing school capacity through the use of centralized clinical placement; and design a nursing education curriculum throughout New England that better meets the needs of our current health care environment.

“This regional collaboration is a testament to hospital associations, nursing organizations, nursing education and practice leaders, foundations, state governments and other stakeholders working together for sustainable solutions,” said David Abelman, executive director of the foundation in a statement.

“This grant reinforces the partnerships between education and practice settings in our state that are necessary to maintain an educated nursing workforce for the future,” said Jean Marie Rocha, vice president, Clinical Affairs at the Hospital Association of Rhode Island and co-leader of the Rhode Island component of the initiative. “Currently all five nursing programs and 13 hospitals across Rhode Island are participating in this grant.”

Led by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation and the Northwest Health Foundation, Partners Investing in Nursing’s Future hopes that local and regional foundations can test innovative ideas locally that can be shared nationally with an exponential effect on the nursing workforce shortage. Foundations receiving funds have forged local partnerships to apply for the competitive grant, raising awareness of the nursing shortage in their own communities.

The three-state collaboration grew out of a partnership between the Massachusetts Hospital Association and the Massachusetts Department of Higher Education (DHE) that examined reasons behind the state’s nursing workforce shortage and other limitations on the capacity to educate new nurses.

To broaden this approach to a regional scale and to respond to similar needs in their states, representatives from Rhode Island and New Hampshire joined Massachusetts to form the Creativity and Connections collaboration. In Rhode Island, the Edward J. and Virginia M.Routhier Foundation will be joining the Tufts Health Plan Foundation to provide funding for nurses who commit to teaching nursing in Rhode Island.

“This grant is an exciting opportunity for us to expand the work we have been doing in Rhode Island to increase nursing faculty, increase nursing school capacity and prepare nurses to meet the demands of today’s complex health care organization,” said Dayle Joseph, dean of the School of Nursing at the University of Rhode Island College and co-leader of the RI component of the initiative. “We will have the opportunity to share best practices with other states in the region and learn from one another as we all are dealing with similar issues around nursing school capacity and the need for increasing nursing faculty.”