Nursing students are getting a wider range of options for schooling now that the Ontario government is allowing colleges to offer Bachelor nursing degree programs.
For colleges, it's the first time they can offer a stand-alone nursing degree without a university partner.
St. Clair College currently partners with the University of Windsor, but Chatham campus students have a harder time getting into Windsor for the final two years of the program.
Vice President of Academics at St. Clair College, Waseem Habash says this will give more stability to students.
"What this is going to do is allow students in rural communities the ability to start their education at a college and finish it at the same college if the college chooses to offer a four-year nursing degree," he says.
Habash says when nursing students sign up now, they take two years at a college and then two years at a university.
"That could mean relocation. It could mean travel for the students back and forth and some of them may opt out of going into a nursing degree because of that," he says.
Habash says studying in one community, particularly if it's rural, helps with nurses staying there.
"When the students go to the school for four years in their local community, they're likely to stay there and end up working in that community," he says. "It'll help bolster the health care in rural areas of the province, not just in the urban cities."
Since 2000, the province has required any college wishing to offer a nursing degree program to partner with a university.
There are currently 60 nursing students at St. Clair's Chatham campus.
With files from Zander Broeckel