Kansas Nursing Workforce Center releases advance report on state of nursing education in Kansas

Kansas lawmakers returning to Topeka today for the beginning of the legislative session will have access to an advance report on the state of nursing education in Kansas prepared for the legislature by the Kansas Nursing Workforce Center. 

Based at the University of Kansas School of Nursing and founded to serve the interests of the entire state, the Kansas Nursing Workforce Center was established in 2023 to address the shortage of nurses across the Sunflower State. “We share the commitment to our mission that all Kansans, wherever and whenever they need a nurse, have access to well-educated nurses,” said Barbara MacArthur, M.N., FAAN, director of the Kansas Nursing Workforce Center and clinical assistant professor at KU School of Nursing.

As the report notes, the demand for nursing care in Kansas is growing, Kansans have increasing health care needs, there are not enough nurses to provide the necessary care and many nurses in the state plan to retire soon. In addition to retaining the existing workforce, ensuring that Kansans have access to nursing care will require increasing the number of students enrolled in prelicensure nursing programs.

Funded by a grant and using data from the Kansas Board of Regents, the governing body for Kansas' public higher education system, the report provides an overview of entry-level, prelicensure nursing programs in Kansas. These include programs that educate students who take the licensed practical nurse (LPN) licensure examination, and associate and bachelor’s degree programs that educate students who take the registered nurse (RN) licensure examination.

The report shows that over the past 10 years in Kansas, despite a 12% increase in seats available in prelicensure nursing programs at Kansas Board of Regents schools, the number of students enrolled actually has declined overall, from 14,543 in 2013 to 9,991 in 2025, though there has been a slight upward trend since 2023. Rates of program completion followed a similar declining trend.

The report provides data on nursing supply and demand,  as well as characteristics of enrollees including age, gender, ethnicity and parental status and other information. The center plans to use this data to pilot solutions that improve ease of access to information about nursing education programs in Kansas, identify programs that meet the needs of potential applicants and increase the number of nursing school applications.

With its grant, the Kansas Board of Regents has funded research focusing on three different aims to test potential solutions. The preliminary report released today is part of the Report Aim, which provides foundational information for stakeholders. The report also supplies information on what degree and certificate programs are offered at individual schools in the state, as well as information on pass rates for licensure tests taken by students from different schools. A more comprehensive report, which will include more detailed information about individual programs, will publish in mid-2026.

The Decide Aim will help potential students, their families and guidance counselors decide which prelicensure nursing education program is the best fit for them. “Rather than trying to explain to everybody in the entire state the nine ways you can get to be a nurse, there are actual things that we can put in place to make it easier for the students to decide,” said MacArthur. The Kansas Nursing Workforce Center is creating a web-based tool for potential students to identify schools that fit their personal needs. It is anticipated that the tool will be released in late spring of 2026.

The third aim, the Apply Aim, calls for a shared nursing school application process to make it easier for students to apply to multiple schools at one time and to track their application progress in one place. Ten schools will be chosen by late spring of 2026 to pilot the application, with the eventual goal of expansion.