Indiana University Health and the IU Health Foundation have announced a transformational partnership with Bloomington philanthropists Connie and Steve Ferguson to expand nursing education at Ivy Tech Community College Bloomington and strengthen Indiana’s nursing workforce.
The Ferguson gift, combined with a $10 million investment from IU Health, will create two endowed funds that support expanded nursing education, scholarships, and ongoing professional development for nurses across IU Health’s South Region.
The Connie & Steve Ferguson Nursing Expansion Endowment will underwrite the Lee J. Marchant School of Nursing at Ivy Tech Bloomington, including the campus’s only evening nursing cohort, faculty salaries and development, facility and equipment upgrades, and additional clinical training capacity in southern Indiana.
A second fund, the South Region Nursing Scholarship Endowment, will provide financial aid to nursing students who commit to work for IU Health after graduation and will invest in continuing education and credentialing for existing IU Health South Region nurses.
By scaling evening and weekend clinical programs, the initiative aims to address an estimated statewide shortfall of about 4,300 nurses while leveraging Ivy Tech’s position as the nation’s leading educator of associate-level nurses, 90% of whom remain in Indiana to live and work. Leaders from IU Health and Ivy Tech say the effort builds on a 2022 IU Health grant that expanded the Marchant School of Nursing’s labs, classrooms, and training beds and positions Bloomington as a key pipeline for the region’s nursing workforce.
