The warning comes from a survey of more than 600 nurse lecturers and others across the UK, including 70 in Scotland. They revealed risks to jobs, including redundancies and recruitment freezes.
Universities across the UK are facing severe financial difficulties due to a significant fall in the number of international students along with rising costs and overheads.
Nursing education staff raised the alarm over university course closures during the Royal College of Nursing’s (RCN) annual conference, as they shared fears about how the issue could impact the nurse recruitment challenge.
In Scotland 66% of respondents said their employer is currently undergoing a process to reduce academic staff costs through voluntary redundancy, staffing restructures and recruitment freezes.
Of those whose employer is reducing academic staff costs 72% said they are directly affected. Respondents shared their concerns for the impact on the student experience, student outcomes and the morale of nurse educators, resulting in them considering leaving nurse education or returning to a clinical role or taking early retirement.
The RCN says urgent action is required to avert a growing catastrophe in the higher education sector, which risks job losses for hundreds of experienced nurse educators and damage to the recruitment and education of tens of thousands of nursing students.
RCN Scotland is calling on the Scottish government through the Ministerial Nursing and Midwifery Taskforce to ensure the sustainability of the nursing academic workforce, and to develop, fund and implement a defined, specific and time-bound workforce plan for nursing academics, setting out clear career pathways and staffing models for academic and research roles including clinical academic roles.
The survey findings are the latest blow for a troubled sector. In 2023, for the second year in a row, not all undergraduate student places were filled and for three years in a row the number of applicants to nursing courses has fallen. In Scotland the number of applicants remains below pre-pandemic levels.
RCN Scotland Executive Director Colin Poolman said: “Nursing is a degree-educated, highly skilled and safety-critical profession, but the very people who teach and train the nurses of the future are being offered voluntary redundancy or severance in an effort to cut costs. The financial crisis in universities is threatening to engulf nursing – we need action now to stop a total collapse of courses.
“What is happening in universities will impact the NHS, the care sector, and their ability to provide safely staffed services. The higher education sector educates and trains registered nurses and without an urgent intervention, ministers and health leaders will face a further deepening of the current nurse recruitment crisis.
“The Ministerial Taskforce must deliver the stability and sustainability the sector needs. That’s how to secure the workforce of the future and protect patient safety.”
