Division of Nursing Receives $70,000 Grant to Aid in Vaccine Confidence Messaging

McKendree University’s Division of Nursing is one of only 10 institutions of higher learning in the nation to have recently been awarded a $70,000 grant to participate in the American Association of Colleges of Nursing’s (AACN) latest campaign. AACN will be using their recently-awarded $1 million in funding from the CDC to launch their new initiative, Building COVID-19 Vaccine Confidence Among Nurses and in Communities, which will tackle health misinformation while bolstering confidence in the COVID-19 vaccines. As part of this project, AACN awarded funding to 10 schools of nursing nationwide to launch these targeted campaigns. McKendree’s Division of Nursing began implementing this new strategy this spring.

With strong partnerships, including the Illinois Critical Access Hospital Network (ICAHN) and the Southern Illinois Public Health Consortium, McKendree will be focusing their messaging in particular on rural areas. The University has also teamed up with four local community colleges to implement this strategy.

“We are so proud and fortunate to have been chosen for this opportunity and to have such strong partnerships to help us build vaccine confidence within central and southern Illinois,” said Dr. Janice Albers ’12, retired assistant professor and director of MSN programs at McKendree University. “This is also a huge benefit to our students because they will gain valuable experience through some of these partnerships in our nursing programs. It’s truly a win-win situation.”

All four nursing programs at McKendree, including the RN to BSN program, MSN program, DNP program and MHA program, will be participating in this new implementation with a two-fold plan. You can read more about it at www.mckendree.edu/news/vaccine-confidence-grant.php.