Bellin Run Aids Nursing Students

April 23, 2010

A portion of the registration fees from the 34th annual Bellin Run will be set aside for a scholarship to benefit nursing students at Bellin College – meaning the race’s top place finishers won’t be the only winners of the day.

The Bellin Run will take place at 8 a.m., Saturday, June 12. In 2009, the event drew 16,746 registrants – a Bellin Run record.

Since 1991, a portion of each Bellin Run participant’s entry fee has been reserved for the Bellin College scholarship fund.

“We raised about $10,000 for the Bellin College scholarship fund last year,” said college spokesman Matt Rentmeester. “Since 1991, that contribution has totaled more than $140,000. Our students are thankful and have told us through the years that they feel fortunate for the educational support the Bellin Run provides each year.”

Bellin College president Jane Muhl says she too is appreciative of the support the Bellin Run provides to the area’s future nurses and caregivers, especially given the widely reported national shortage of qualified nurses.

According to the USA Today, “the national nursing shortage could reach 500,000 by 2025, as many nurses retire and the demand for nurses balloons with the aging of baby boomers.” The U.S. Health Resources and Services Administration projects the shortage will be more than 1 million by 2020.

On the American Association of Colleges of Nursing web site, an entry on the nursing shortage says: “The July/August 2009 Health Affairs … found that despite the current easing of the nursing shortage due to the recession, the U.S. nursing shortage is projected to grow to 260,000 registered nurses by 2025. A shortage of this magnitude would be twice as large as any nursing shortage experienced in this country since the mid-1960s.”

Projections vary on the nursing shortage. However, according to Muhl, “one thing we’re certain of is that there will indeed be a shortage of qualified nurses but the scholarship provided by the Bellin Run will help us combat that in Northeast Wisconsin.”