Sudbury nursing student enrollment steady, officials say

Officials at Cambrian College say enrollment in both the Bachelor of Science in Nursing and Practical Nursing has remained steady throughout the pandemic and it's expected to remain consistent for the intakes this fall.

“Both programs have a limited number of seats available, and both programs have continued to be full. In addition, Cambrian added an intake in January 2022 for Practical Nursing and intends to offer the program in January 2023, increasing opportunities for students interested in pursuing a nursing career. Also, during the pandemic, Cambrian's nursing students were able to complete their placements in health care settings, allowing them to graduate and be prepared to write their certification exams in the traditional timeframes,” says June Raymond, dean of the School of Health Sciences, Nursing, and Emergency Services at Cambrian College.

Meantime at Laurentian University officials say there has been a small but steady decline in enrollment. In 2019, there were 400 students enrolled in both French and English undergratuate nursing programs. In 2021, there were 354 students.

Cambrian officials add that they are excited to welcome the schools first cohort of students into the colleges stand-alone bachelor of nursing program this fall after severing ties with Laurentian. For the past twenty years, colleges have partnered with universities to offer the bachelor programs, but in 2020, the provincial government said colleges could offer their own.

Sara St. Germain began her nursing education in 2017. Due to the strike at Cambrian College that year and personal reasons she took a step back from her schooling. She decided to return in 2021.

St. Germain decided to return to school to complete her education to become a registered practical nurse over a registered nurse because she said the pay isn’t really that different. She like many who are now going into the profession are not doing it so they can work in a hospital.

“Last time, I wanted to work in a hospital, that was what I was going to do. This time around I’m doing nursing to not even really work in a hospital at all,” says St. Germain.

“There are so many different things that you can do with nursing, like for myself for example, when I’m done I’m going to be taking an injections course so that I can further my business so I’ll be doing the cosmetic side of it. You can work in a doctors office; you can work for public health; I know many nurses now that are leaving the hospital and going into things like public health or even long term care.”

St. Germain says she is not surprised to see enrollment numbers where they are today and it is hard to say how that may change over the coming years.

“It could go either way; people could be saying there are so many job opportunities that they might as well enroll or they might be like that is you are constantly working short and you are going to drive yourself into the ground so you don’t want to do it,” added St. Germain.