Dalton State College’s School of Nursing was recently granted reaccreditation status for the next four years by the Georgia Board of Nursing (GBON), college officials have an-nounced.

Dalton State officials were notified in June that the current accredited status will remain in place through December 31, 2013, according to Dr. Cordia Starling, dean of the School of Nursing.

“It’s important to us to continue our accreditation status because doing so confirms the quality of our program,” Starling says.

Every four years, each school or division of nursing comes under review by the Georgia Board of Nurses, Starling says, in order to assess the strengths and weaknesses of the cur-riculum, the self-evaluation methodology and the quality of classroom and clinical instruc-tion.

“We’re proud of our program and are always looking to be the best that we can be. Our ul-timate goal is to graduate safe and effective healthcare providers who will serve this region, our state and even the nation.”

Representatives from GBON made a two-day site visit in October of last year and re-ported their findings to the board in May, recommending full approval of reaccreditation.

The report included nine commendations for the School of Nursing, listing what the board considers to be many of the nursing program’s strengths, including strong administra-tive support for the acquisition of equipment and supplies, detailed course materials and guidelines for students which enhance learning, and practice-based learning activities.

Over the past year, says Starling, the School of Nursing has been revamping its curricu-lum to reflect changes and trends that have occurred in healthcare field. The restructuring process necessitated program review and approval by the National League for Nurses Ac-crediting Commission (NLNAC) as well, she says, noting that college officials also learned in June that the NLNAC also granted full approval for the curriculum changes.

“The changes we’ve made to the curriculum, including increasing nursing instruction from just half a semester for freshmen to full-semesters, should make retention of the sub-ject matter easier for the students. We expect that we’ll see this reflected on their perform-ance on their state boards.”