First DNP students in class at Southern Miss

HATTIESBURG — The University of Southern Mississippi (USM) School of Nursing recently welcomed the first students in the inaugural class of the doctor of nursing practice (DNP) program.

Unlike the traditional research-based Ph.D in nursing program, whose focus is on knowledge generation, the DNP model ensures that evidenced-based knowledge makes its way in the healthcare arena.

The USM School of Nursing and the University of Mississippi Medical Center (UMMC) have partnered to grant the DNP degree through a consortium model. Other schools in the consortium, Alcorn State University, Delta State University and the Mississippi University for Women, will share state resources, such as faculty, and will utilize classes taught by distance learning technology to each university in the consortium. Students will be able to take the core DNP classes at any of the five universities in the consortium and receive the degree from one of the two degree-granting schools, USM and UMMC.