ICN and the National League for Nursing focus on prioritising investment in nursing education

The International Council of Nurses (ICN) is launching a new global education expert advisory committee with the National League for Nursing (NLN), that will focus on prioritising investment in nursing education.

The aim of the ICN Education Experts Advisory Committee (ICNEE) will be to plan how we both scale up education, make sure that education is fit for purpose and ensure nurses are prepared for the challenges ahead. The work of the ICNEE will help to shape thinking around the production of the forthcoming second World Health Organization State of the World’s Nurses report, in collaboration with ICN, to ensure the report includes careful analysis of the adequacy and impact of educational programs for the future nursing workforce.

The ICNEE committee will have 14 members from all World Health Organization regions, who will be appointed on the recommendations of ICN.

Its aim is to help optimise ICN’s role in disseminating best practices in education around the world.

ICN President, Dr Pamela Cipriano, said the ICNEE would maximise the impact of ICN and NLN’s educational activities and initiatives. Dr Cipriano said: “The ICN was set up in 1899 to ensure that nurses around the world were united with each other and cooperating to raise the standards of nursing education and professional ethics so that nurses could bring their professional knowledge and skill to meet patients’ needs everywhere.

‘Reinvigorating the ICNEE will help us to continue with that noble cause for the benefit of individuals, families and communities around the globe.

‘I look forward to working with the Committee once it is set up, and I am sure it will make an important contribution to our goals of improving nursing education and recruiting many more nurse educators, who are so vital in this endeavour.”

The ICNEE will be hosted by the NLN’s Institute for Diversity and Global Initiatives and chaired by Dr Sandra Davis, Deputy Director for the NLN/Walden University School of Nursing Institute for Social Determinants of Health & Social Change.

Dr Davis said: “I look forward to bringing my knowledge and experience to the urgent task of broadening and deepening the commitment to quality and equity in nursing education among the family of nations represented within the World Health Organization, as well as working with esteemed colleagues at the ICN to accomplish our mission.”

The new committee will be officially announced at NLN’s Education Summit on September 28-30 at National Harbor near Washington, DC, USA.