The U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration (HRSA) has awarded a $1.3 million grant to the Emory University Nell Hodgson Woodruff School of Nursing to participate in a program to incentivize careers as nursing school faculty through low-interest loans and loan cancelation.

The Nurse Faculty Loan Program (NFLP) provides low-interest loans to individuals studying to be nurse faculty and cancels 85% of loans in exchange for four years of full-time nurse faculty employment after graduation. Recipients can serve as full-time faculty members, part-time faculty members with a part-time clinical educator/preceptor appointment, or full-time advanced practice registered nurse preceptors in an academic-practice partnership.

Through the grant, Emory School of Nursing doctoral students committed to teaching nursing are eligible to receive up to a $40,000 loan for the 2024-25 academic year, with the option to reapply for subsequent years of study. Students can use the loans for tuition, fees, books, lab expenses and other educational costs.

Emory NFLP project director Kristy Martyn, PhD, RN, CPNP-PC, FAAN, says the Nurse Faculty Loan Program’s goal is to grow the number of nursing educators, which is critical to increasing the nursing workforce.

“Without an adequate number of nursing faculty and mentors, schools are limited in the number of students they can prepare,” says Martyn, who also serves as a professor and the Independence Chair in Nursing at the Emory School of Nursing. “We are committed to being part of a program that optimizes the conditions for graduating more nurse educators and — ultimately — more nurses, which will be key to meeting the nation’s health care needs.”

For more information, email [email protected] or visit nursing.emory.edu/overview/financial-aid-and-scholarships.