The College of Nursing, as an integral part of its parent institution, is dedicated to the pursuit of higher learning grounded in the arts, sciences, and humanities. The College of Nursing shares the missions of the University of Colorado Denver: improving human health by educating health practitioners, delivering exemplary health care, and conducting research in the health sciences. The missions of the institution are directed toward a diverse community and the university acknowledges, values, fosters and benefits from the unique qualities, rich histories and wide range of cultural values. The philosophy and mission of the College of Nursing are focused on education, research, reflective practice, and service within nursing.
The College of Nursing faculty believe nursing is a professional discipline with academic and practice dimensions. As a practice profession, nursing serves society through delivery of direct and indirect health care services to individuals, families and communities in local, regional, national, and international contexts. Nursing is a theory-guided, evidence-based practice, focused on holistic, relationship-centered caring that facilitates health and healing. Nursing is committed to ensuring quality health care for all. Nurses engage in political leadership to improve the health and health care of the society they serve. As a discipline responsible for knowledge generation, nursing is committed to:
- A search for knowledge regarding human experiences of health-illness-healing, the human/technology interface, environmental contexts of health care, and quality cost effective outcomes;
- Development and testing of explanatory models of health, illness, and healing to guide professional practice;
- Positive influence on the environmental contexts of health and health care; and
- Promotion of quality and cost effective outcomes of nursing care. The College of Nursing faculty believe that generation of disciplinary knowledge is founded upon pluralistic forms of inquiry, continual with nursing practice, and interdisciplinary collaboration.
The College of Nursing faculty believe that higher education in nursing is responsible for preparing nurses for professional and discipline-related roles through a competency based curriculum emphasizing practice that is relational, reflective, responsive, respectful, and caring. Thus, the faculty believe in the equivalent importance of undergraduate nursing education, graduate nursing education, and nursing education to prepare entry-level nurses with a professional doctorate. The faculty believe in education’s responsibility to society in advocacy for social justice, and in education’s need to be responsive to society’s needs and changing local, national and global health care environments. They are committed to promoting reflective practice, and leadership for social change with inherent reciprocity among nursing practice, theory, and research in all educational programs. The faculty further believe that preparation for various nursing roles requires education in the arts and sciences foundational to nursing and in substantive disciplinary knowledge regarding caring in the human health experience across the lifespan. The faculty believe that contemporary nursing education and practice require a commitment to diversity, interdisciplinary partnerships in practice and research, and a grounding of education in faculty practice. Faculty practice models expert care and community service; provides opportunities to develop innovative models of health care delivery; improves access to care for underserved populations; engages in clinical inquiry; and tests nursing theories. Contemporary nursing education also is facilitated by articulated degree programs, flexible and self-directed programs that incorporate lifelong learning, innovative educational technologies, and inter-institutional collaboration. |
