25: TODAY, TOMORROW, AND IN THE FUTURE ■ 561■ THE DOCTORAL ADVANCED NURSING PRACTICE “EDUCATOR”
To meet current and projected nursing shortages, nursing education programs need
to increase their capacity. However, these programs are faced with a severe short-
age of faculty , particularly doctorally prepared faculty, making it difficult to expand.
Furthermore, the already small pool of qualified faculty is rapidly shrinking— almost
one third are older than 55 years (Benner, Sutphen, Leonard, & Day, 2009). The cur-
rent system of doctoral education in nursing does not have the capacity to prepare the
number of graduates necessary to replace retiring faculty, and does not have a suffi-
cient number of nurse researchers to generate knowledge for the discipline (Potempa,
Redman, & Anderson, 2008). Therefore, in the United States, the nursing profession
is at an important crossroads that could determine the direction of nursing education
and knowledge development. Equally important, will DNP graduates really be pre-
pared to assume competent nurse educator roles for advanced practice programs?
Who will generate the knowledge of the discipline? Furthermore, the current climate
does not encourage young men and women to embrace the faculty role or the conduct
of research in its broadest sense.
Current expectations of the tripartite nursing faculty role in relation to teaching,
scholarship, and service are not realistic in advancing nursing science, clinical practice,
or education. Nursing faculty juggle large teaching and service loads while attempt-
ing to engage in scholarship. For those nursing faculty who are actively involved in
research, the juggling act is even more pronounced. In addition, few nursing faculty
have formal practice appointments as part of their faculty role that allows them to stay
clinically updated to perform their teaching. For example, many NP, nurse- midwifery,
and nurse anesthesia faculty have outside practice obligations to maintain their clinical
hours/ expertise for specialty certification in addition to their full- time faculty appoint-
ments. Many advanced practice nurse faculty opt for this financial arrangement in order
to gain additional compensation given the low salaries of nursing faculty. Efforts to
recruit future faculty will continue to be futile unless faculty salaries are increased and
brought in line with clinical salaries and teaching positions in other disciplines (Benner
et al., 2009). Going forward, nursing faculty salaries must be reevaluated in order to
compete with nonacademic positions available to doctoral- level nursing professionals.
Nursing leaders need to look to their academic colleagues in male- dominated profes-
sions, such as business, engineering, and law, to seek solutions related to faculty com-
pensation. Another recommendation is to tie market salaries to accreditation and create
formal academic clinical partnerships, and practice arrangements in an effort to increase
salaries and inform clinical teaching. In other words, formal faculty practice arrange-
ments need to become the norm beyond academic health centers.
We are also concerned about whether DAPNs with DNPs who have academic
appointments will be promoted or tenured in a clinical track or research track? If the
faculty NP, for instance, needs to practice to maintain certification as well as con-
duct research in order to get tenure, how will this occur? We see three unfortunate
scenarios. In scenario A, the faculty NP is not allowed on the tenure track because
he/ she did not complete a clinical dissertation or doctoral thesis. In this case, vast
numbers of faculty NPs will be excluded from full membership in the academy or
the professoriate. In scenario B, the DNP graduate is allowed on the tenure track, but
because this faculty NP now has to produce the level of scholarship necessary for ten-
ure and practice— not just for recertification, but to be competent and current in the
graduate classroom— this faculty member is set up for failure. In scenario C, the DNP
is not prepared to engage in the research/ scholarship aspects of the role and has a