Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner Program Director

Job Description:

Fairfield University is a co-educational, comprehensive Catholic Jesuit university with a 200-acre campus located along the scenic shoreline community of Fairfield, CT, consisting of five schools: The College of Arts and Sciences, The Charles F. Dolan School of Business, The School of Engineering, The Marion Peckham Egan School of Nursing and Health Studies, and The School of Education and Human Development.  As an expression of our Jesuit, Catholic mission and identity, Fairfield embraces a liberal humanistic approach to education, encouraging critical thinking, cultivating free and open inquiry, and fostering ethical and religious values.
 

Position Description

The Psychiatric Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (PMHNP) Program Director in the Egan School possesses overall, year-round responsibility for their respective units. They are all certified in their respective specialty and population-focused areas of practice as specified by relevant regulatory and specialty bodies, if applicable. The PMHNP Program Director has release time and/or stipends commensurate with responsibilities of the program.  Program Directors report directly to the respective Associate Dean/s to ensure that organizational policies related to faculty roles and workload are applied to the program in a manner that recognizes and supports the academic and practice aspects of respective Programs.

KNOWLEDGE & SKILLS NEEDED:

The program director must:

• Have earned doctoral degree and three years professional experience post credentialing or have earned a master’s degree and have five years professional experience post credentialing.

• Have teaching and administrative experiences commensurate with position responsibilities.

• Be credentialed in respective specialty area, if applicable

• Be a full-time employee of the University

• Not direct another specialty within the School or University.

RESPONSIBILITIES:

The program director responsibilities must include, but are not limited to:

• Provision or delegation of responsibilities to assure year-round coverage of director responsibilities.

• Collaborative development and application of policies and procedures for effectively managing all components of the program and to ensure fair, equitable and considerate treatment of prospective and enrolled students (such as program admission, retention and completion policies).

• Full participation in all student recruitment activities, including those sponsored by Admissions.

• Regular communication with students admitted to the program, including a minimum of one email/semester, and provision of additional opportunities as needed for advisement, evaluation, and counseling.

• Leading efforts to identify, establish, and maintain all clinical sites in collaboration with the Clinical Coordinators.

• Regular communication with clinical faculty and preceptors to review program expectations, evaluate site resources, and collaborate on student performance evaluation.

• Evaluate clinical experiences in terms of the adequacy and appropriateness of assignments available, the level of staff support, the willingness of agency personnel to allow students to engage in experiences needed to meet course objectives, and the diversity of client situations available.

• Provision of annual review of program outcomes, including student enrollment and recruitment, completed or anticipated revisions to courses or curriculum plan, clinical site experiences, and anticipated needs of students, faculty, and staff.

• Analyze program data, share with institutional representatives, and incorporate into school planning.

• Serve as chair of program curriculum committee, as appropriate.

Responsibility for PMHNP Student Clinical Placements

• Works with the administrative team to identify clinical placement needs for students each semester and works with the identified clinical sites to secure those placements.

• Takes initiative and outreach to identify and collaboratively partner with new regional health care providers, students, alumni, and other interested parties to increase the placement site base for programs.

• Responsible for planning, coordinating, establishing, evaluating, and maintaining site placements and preceptors for student clinical experiences.

• Ensures appropriate, quality clinical experiences for students in the Egan School based on specified requirements, goals, and practice specialty.

• Develops new clinical site recruitment, collaborative relationships with existing site preceptors, contract negotiations and finalization, student clin