DANVILLE, Va. – When Lori Owens walks the halls of Sovah Health's Danville campus, she sees first hand how beneficial Danville Community College's nursing program is.
Owens is the director of acute care nursing at the hospital.
Without DCC's program, the hospital would have a tough time filling nursing positions.
"I personally go to other schools to recruit, to try to recruit, and it's very few and far between that we will get a student," Owens said.
Not only does the nursing program help supply the hospital with nurses, the program provides high quality nurses, Owens said.
"They jump in, they have initiating qualities that you don't see in other programs," explained Owens. "It's huge because the majority of the students, about 80 percent of them, they're from the locale of Danville. So they're treating not only their family but their friends, people they've gone to high school with, people they've gone to church with, that sort of thing. It's really good to keep us in a family oriented environment."
According to registerednursing.org, programs were ranked primarily based on the number of students who pass the national exam required to get a nursing license.
DCC's nursing program coordinator, Cathy Barrett, said the program has had a 100 percent pass rate since 2015.
"We have a great faculty here at DCC with the nursing program and we also have great clinical facilities in the area," Barrett said.
As good as the program may be, though, she said it is reassessed every semester and students are frequently asked for feedback in order to make it even better.