Provost Louis Esposito appointed a task force in the spring of 2000 with a charge to recommend to the provost the appropriate organizational structure for the schools of Nursing and Health Sciences. In his charge to the task force, the provost specifically said that financial considerations were not to be considered in the review. Rather, the task force was to consider the academic implications of different organizational patterns, with a particular emphasis on the impact such a change would have on students.

The picture across the country is mixed, and it is shifting. The dominant pattern in the country still is to have separate schools for nursing and health sciences, and most of the large, research- intensive schools have independent schools. For example, Michigan State, Wayne, and the University of Michigan, all have separate schools. The schools selected for our benchmarking (similar in size and scope to OU) have a much more mixed organizational pattern.

The shift has been toward consolidation. Several institutions have merged nursing and health sciences in the past decade – some for programmatic reasons and others driven by financial considerations. Interestingly enough, in some of the mergers, some universities had retained the School title for either nursing or health sciences within the umbrella of a combined College or Nursing and Health Sciences. It is important to note that several universities have considered and rejected a consolidation.

Reaching a consensus on a sensitive issue such as this one is not an easy task, and all members of the task force wrestled with the values associated with combining our schools, maintaining them as separate entities, or finding a different option that would serve the needs of the students and faculty in health professions. We had to balance the positive attributes of combining the schools with the readiness of Oakland to deal with an organizational change of this magnitude.

Recommendation

The task force, without a minority or dissenting opinion, recommends that:

1. Oakland establish a clear institutional goal of fostering cooperative ventures in our health-related disciplines, and that such a goal encompasses interdisciplinary research, development of appropriate common courses, team-teaching across school lines, and interdisciplinary learning opportunities for students.
2. In order to assist in the achievement of this goal, Oakland establish a Center for Interdisciplinary Health Initiatives, and that participation in such an Center should not only come from the School of Nursing and the School of Health Sciences, but from other health-related programs such as the Eye Research Center, the health-care finance area of the business school, the biomedical research center, health and environmental chemistry, and medical physics.
3. The provost appoints in the winter of 2001 a group to plan the Center for Interdisciplinary Health Initiatives. The target date for implementing such a Center, with a faculty director, should be no later than the end of the Fall Semester 2001. The organizational "host" for the Center would be determined as part of the planning process. We envision that the Center would have an initial life span of five years, at which time its success would be evaluated. We also believe that to be successful, such a Center must have clearly defined desired outcomes at the beginning (e.g., total external research support for interdisciplinary work; number of common courses developed during the five-year period).
4. The provost proceed with the hiring of a new dean for the School of Nursing, and both that individual and the Dean of Health Sciences be given a mandate (and resources) to foster inter-school cooperation in health-related fields.

Members of the task force concluded that a full-scale consolidation of the two schools is not appropriate at this time. We were impressed by what had been accomplished at some institutions where a change in organization has occurred. The majority of those units that were successful attributed their accomplishments to strong leadership. Members of the task force are very sympathetic to a number of the objectives often associated with a consolidation (such as the focus on interdisciplinary activities in both teaching and research). While we were constrained from responding from a financial perspective, competition for funding is fierce on any campus, and the small size of the two schools is inevitably a factor in the allocation of resources. Even if the two schools were combined, they would have fewer faculty members than any of the other professional schools at Oakland. We noted with interest the organizational changes in the health care industry in recent years, and believe that a different approach within the university to health care education could create some synergies that would give Oakland a much more prominent role in the health care community. Finally, the task force is intrigued with the notion that the biomedical sciences could be identified as an "institutional area of excellence." If the university had already identified the biomedical sciences as an area of excellence, some members of the task force believe a combined school an with increased research activity and a stronger interdisciplinary focus would be an important factor in leading Oakland’s initiative in this arena, especially in an academic community involving several other health-related programs.

We recognize the distinct differences between nursing and the health sciences, and respect the importance of the "independence" of the individual professions within the two schools. We note that those differences are not greater than the disciplinary differences in the College or even indeed in several of our professional schools. Those individual professional identities alone are not enough to deter an organizational change.

At the same time, we believe Oakland is not ready for such a consolidation to be a success. The nursing profession faces a critical shortage. Some, including the Board of Visitors from the School of Nursing, argue that full attention should be focused on the shortage issue, and that the distractions and administrative work associated with a major organizational change hinder our ability to respond appropriately to the shortage.

We also must take into account the Oakland history. Both schools have had a long and productive record as independent schools, and that is not to be tossed aside lightly. There is a significant health care focus in the College of Arts and Sciences, and in the segments of the faculty in the other professional schools (particularly health care finance), and those efforts also have operated independently in the past.

In addition, we recognize that for such a consolidation to be a success, the faculty needs to be engaged in the effort. One university that recently underwent a consolidation had the support of 100% of the nursing faculty and 80% of the health science faculty. That kind of faculty support is not present here.

We also believe that there is significant risk if we do nothing. The lost opportunities will be felt by both schools and by the institution. Therefore we went the route of recommending the creation of the Center. Carefully crafted, with targeted outcomes, such a Center can have an enormous impact on the institution. It is not, in our mind, simply a way of papering over the significant differences between the advocates of association and the champions of independence, but a way of building a common base between nursing, health sciences, and other health-related efforts on campus.

The School of Nursing was established in 1974 when Providence Hospital approached the university to start a baccalaureate program in nursing. Providence, like many hospitals, was abandoning its three-year, hospital-based nursing school, and it sought a four-year institution that was prepared to launch a nursing school. Geraldene Felton was the first dean of nursing, followed by Andrea Lindell and Justine Speer. A number of faculty have served as acting deans during the interim periods between Deans Felton, Lindell, and Speer. There are 23 full-time and 20 part-time faculty in the School of Nursing, and they provide instruction to 601 undergraduate and 116 graduate students in the school. The undergraduate program includes students admitted to the school at the sophomore level as well as students who have obtained prior nursing RN education (primarily at the community college). The graduate program includes tracks in family nurse practitioner, nurse anesthesia, and adult health.

The School of Health Sciences emerged in the mid 1980s from the academic programs in the old Center for Allied Health. Moon J. Pak was director of the center, and following a two-year interim dean appointment for Joel Russell, Ronald Olson has served as the first and only regular dean of the School of Health Sciences. There are 18 full-time and 88 part-time faculty in the school, and they serve 519 undergraduate and 84 graduate students. Programs in the school include physical therapy (master’s), medical laboratory sciences (primarily medical technology), industrial health and safety, health behavioral sciences, and exercise science (master’s).

Both schools offer a number of graduate certificate programs, as well as the regular master’s degree programs. Neither school offers a doctoral program.

The university previously considered a merger of the two schools (in late 1993) but that effort was aborted in the face of significant opposition from students and faculty, particularly in nursing. We note that efforts toward inter-school consolidation or cooperation have not occurred in the interim; thus we don’t have the tradition of active cooperation between the units.

The task force spent its initial efforts on gathering data on the two schools at Oakland, and in defining the work of the task force. This early work also considered various organizational options beside the two options we debated at the end.

The task force then conducted phone interviews with approximately 40 institutions across the country, trying to ascertain the level of interest/action in the area of consolidation of nursing and health sciences. We focused on institutions that:

1. Had both undergraduate and graduate programs in nursing and in health sciences;
2. Had a program mix in nursing and health sciences similar, though not necessarily identical, to Oakland’s;
3. Did not have a medical school; and
4. Had a total student population of 5,000-20,000 students.

This population of forty provided a good mix of schools with combined nursing/health sciences schools and separately organized schools. Within the group of combined schools, a number had merged in recent years and we found their considerations to be instructive.

From the list of forty, the task force selected four institutions to visit: three that had consolidated nursing and health sciences; and one that had maintained separate schools. The University of North Carolina at Greensboro represented the latter group, while Northeastern University, Wichita State University, and the University of Northern Colorado represented merged schools. We had hoped to visit a school that had considered and rejected a merger, but two schools that recently went through that process did not wish to re-open campus political wounds and declined site visits.

UNC-Greensboro is somewhat smaller than Oakland, with 13,000 students. Its nursing and health science programs are larger than OU’s (three times the number of fulltime faculty), and its health professions school has a doctoral program in exercise science. UNCG has always operated nursing and the health sciences as separate schools.

The University of Northern Colorado, enrollment 12,000, houses a School of Nursing, a School of Kinesiology, and Departments of Communication Disorders, Community Health and Nutrition, and Human Services in its College of Health and Human Services. While the nursing program is approximately the same size as Oakland’s, the other programs combined are substantially larger than Oakland’s Health Sciences programs.

Wichita State University is a peer institution for Oakland. With 14,613 undergraduate and graduate students, Wichita is primarily a commuter campus. The combined College of Health Professions houses a School of Nursing and a School of Health Sciences with programs similar in content to Oakland.

Northeastern University enrolls 19,000 students, including 3500 graduate students. The recently reorganized College of Health Sciences contains the Schools of Nursing (30 FTE faculty), Health Professions (80 FTE), and Pharmacy (30 FTE). Undergraduate majors include: athletic training, cardiopulmonary sciences, medical laboratory science, physical therapy, speech-language pathology, nursing, pharmacy, toxicology, and dental hygiene. The only graduate degree program offered is a Doctor of Pharmacy. As a private institution, financial issues are of great importance and many felt that the combined schools gave the college more flexibility in staffing as needs and programs change.

In addition to these calls and visits, the task force met with all deans at Oakland, plus the vice provosts for graduate and undergraduate education; it reported to the university senate and held an open forum for faculty following the senate meeting; and it held two open hearings for faculty in the two schools and one for students in the two schools. In addition, the task force sought, via a broadcast e-mail, general faculty input prior to making its recommendation. Both school assemblies were given updates on the work of the task force, and the School of Nursing Board of Visitors had a special meeting to consider the pros and cons of a merger.

Concluding Remarks

We all wrestled with these recommendations. There are equally strong arguments to support retention of separate schools as well as to support a merger of the two schools. In the final analysis, in the absence of compelling reasons to merge, we support a structure that retains the independent structures of each school but creates significant and meaningful opportunities to build upon strengths already inherent in both schools. We did not have the hammer of a fiscal crisis driving our deliberations, and in some way that made the task more challenging. We sought benchmark data from other universities, and that was helpful. We also needed to take that external data and place it in the OU context, and that, of course, was much more difficult. We believe our recommendation is the best structure to assist Oakland University to meet its strategic goals as well as develop and promote teaching, scholarship, and service within and between The School of Nursing and the School of Health Sciences.

William Connellan, journalism, chair
Brian Goslin, exercise science
Beth Marcoux, physical therapy
Barbara Moore, vice president, Trinity Health Systems, and SHS Board of Visitors
Diane Norris, nursing
Teresa Thompson, nursing 
Paul Tomboulian, chemistry 
Kate Vincent, nursing 
Mary Lou Wesley, vice president, Trinity Health Systems, and SON Board of Visitors