Building the Bridge to Quality in NP Education: The Balanced Scorecard Approach

As academic institutions are increasingly held accountable to stakeholders and customer groups to produce high quality graduates, schools of nursing need to address these expectations.  While there is not a preferred method to measure program effectiveness in advanced practice nursing programs, the Balanced Scorecard (Kaplan & Norton, 1992) utilized in business and industry, provides an approach that can be adapted for use in academe. The balanced scorecard is a performance management and strategic planning perspective that can assist an advanced practice nursing program to align activities with mission and vision, improve internal and external communications, and monitor the program’s performance against strategic goals.  This presentation describes one program’s initiative to implement a balanced scorecard to guide improvement and strategic planning for their family nurse practitioner (FNP) program.   

The project brought together PhD and DNP prepared faculty colleagues to collaboratively design the balanced scorecard that aligned FNP programmatic activities with metrics. The process involved an extensive evaluation of current sources of program effectiveness data (HESI exam score, summative OSCE results, ANCC and AANP certification exam patterns, and student satisfaction data) along with an assessment of the FNP curriculum in the context of the new essentials for master’s education in nursing.  Local and national driving forces that impact FNP education were also considered. The resultant scorecard demonstrated primary emphasis on organizational mission and vision and the customer perspective but also attended to fiscal responsibility, business processes and the professional learning and growth needs of faculty and staff. The scorecard also provided a strategic plan to drive innovations in curriculum, including the potential transition to a BSN to DNP curriculum.