Whether for NP, DNP or PhD degrees, nurses are returning to organizations of higher education to seek degrees that will allow them to earn more money. In this resource guide, we explore how school rates as an investment, with the caveat that the longer you wait to return to school, the less time you will have in your career for a return on that investment. There are no inexpensive programs in higher education in America — just more options. For some older nurses, certification may be a more dollar friendly alternative to another degree. Beyond money, nurses as patient advocates rightfully want to know the effects, if any, of more schooling on patient care. Nurses who have been around know that when a shortage strikes, many well-intentioned educational requirements go out the window. With a new scarcity developing, we investigated what that might do to BSN-related mandates.

We also considered how to raise the faculty that is needed to educate all these new and returning students. When we think shortage, we should be thinking teachers along with students. And so, as nurses increasingly return to school, they might consider becoming a part of the same cohort that is educating them now. We will always need more teachers. I don’t regret a single day of the 15 years of formal education I had past high school. But if I had just one thing to change in my career, I would have gone back to school sooner.