Albany Law School and the University at Albany are expanding programs in a move to attract new students.
A former Albany Law School student has given the school a $1 million gift aimed at supporting firefighters, EMS and nontraditional Albany Law students. Christopher Steadman is a former Albany area attorney who now lives in New Hampshire. He pursued his law degree after working as a carpenter for years.
Albany Law Director of Annual Giving Kaitlyn Lounsbury says a scholarship named for Steadman will provide full, yearlong tuition to a student who has given back to the community.
"We at Albany Law School are tremendously thrilled to be the recipient of Mr. Steadman's generous gift to support specifically volunteer or on call firefighters and medical responders or non-traditional students," Lounsbury said. "We know that this is a tremendously vital role within communities. And the fact that Mr. Steadman was very impressed with his experience here at the law school, and wants to pay it forward. He himself has been a volunteer firefighter in multiple departments, both here in New York, as well as in New Hampshire, where he currently resides. He has a great understanding of the vital services that volunteer firefighters and first responders provide in their communities. And he just wanted to provide an opportunity for a legal education for individuals who are serving in these vital roles."
Lounsbury says the Steadman Scholarship will be awarded annually through the school's Scholarship Committee.
“Obviously, this one is a bit unique in a volunteer, on-call firefighting arena that we're looking to support," Lounsbury said. "The scholarship committee will review those applications and then ultimately award tuition to one or more students.”
Also this week, the University at Albany announced the launch of two new nursing programs to begin in the fall through the School of Public Health. UAlbany provost and Vice President Carol Kim:
“We're very excited about the new nursing program, in one, a Bachelor of Science completion program in nursing, and the other a Masters of Science and Population Health Nursing," said Kim. "And so really, what we're excited about is the fact that we're developing this pipeline in nursing with our very good partners, Hudson Valley Community College. They are, they have the Associate's Degree program in Registered Nurse program, RN. And then because of the 2017, New York State law, the BSN in 10, we were able to partner with Hudson Valley and provide the completion program for the nursing. So they would get a Bachelors of Science in Nursing through this collaboration with HVCC and UAlbany.”
Kim says the collaboration doesn't stop there.
“If the student is interested in continuing with education or education in nursing, then we have this master's in population health nursing," Kim said. "And as you know, especially post pandemic, this population, community health nursing is really important, especially with the social and health disparities that we saw during the pandemic. That is something that that the healthcare field is much more aware of. And that should be part of the training and education for our health care providers.”
Kim says both programs will help address the critical shortage of healthcare workers in New York. She adds that in the last two years, there have been more than 90,000 applicants for positions in nursing schools but only a fraction of those have been able to be accepted into existing nursing programs in the state.
