No, you do not have to file a FAFSA to be eligible for the BHSH Nurse Scholars grant program, although filing a FAFSA is always encouraged as you may be eligible for federal aid.

• A student in the traditional nursing program will receive 5 semesters of a $4,000 grant, totaling $20,000
• A student in the second degree nursing program will receive 4 semesters of a $5,000 grant, totaling $20,000

The Nurse Scholars Grant will be given to each qualified student who agrees to two years of continual employment in an Corewell Health West Michigan hospital Inpatient Setting (defined as the emergency department, any inpatient nursing unit, surgical services (non-ambulatory sites), endoscopy, radiology and the cardiac catheterization lab) which includes the following: Corewell Health Big Rapids, Corewell Health Continuing Care, Corewell Health Gerber Memorial, Helen DeVos Children's Hospital, Corewell Health Hospital Group, Corewell Health Kelsey, Corewell Health Ludington Hospital, Corewell Health Pennock Hospital, Corewell Health Reed City Hospital, Corewell Health Greenville and Corewell Health Zeeland Community Hospital.

The scholar will be employed within a Corewell Health West location. If there is not a position open in your interest area, you can join the new graduate float pool. This will give you flexibility in your employment until a position in your area of interest opens up. During this time in the float pool, you may also discover another area that interests you!

The Nurse Scholars Grant will be given to each qualified student who agrees to two years of continual employment in CHW hospital Inpatient Setting which includes the following: Corewell Health Big Rapids, Corewell Health Continuing Care, Corewell Health Gerber Memorial, Corewell Health Hospitals dba Spectrum Health Hospital Group, Corewell Health Kelsey, Corewell Health Ludington Hospital, Corewell Health Pennock Hospital, Corewell Health Reed City Hospital, Corewell Health Greenville, Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital and Corewell Health Zeeland Community Hospital. Transfer to an entity outside of CHW, including Corewell Health East (Legacy Beaumont) or Corewell Health South (Legacy Lakeland), is a breach of the employment obligation

• If you are unable to complete your employment obligation for any reason, you can request a temporary leave of absence for completing your employment obligation. You must communicate with Corewell Health to gain approval for a suspension of the employment obligation.
• If you do not complete your Corewell Health service obligation, the Nurse Scholars Grant(s) you received will be converted to loans that you must repay in full. For this reason, it is very important that you fully understand the terms and conditions of the Nurse Scholars Grant service obligation before you accept a Nurse Scholars Grant.

After GVSU has disbursed Nurse Scholar Grant funds to you, you may cancel all or part of the Grant by notifying GVSU that you want to cancel the grant within 14 days after the start of the semester. If you notify GVSU that you want to cancel all or a portion of a Grant within this timeframe, you will be expected to repay the Grant at that time.

Your Nurse Scholars Grant would turn into an interest free loan that would be repaid to GVSU.

If hired into Corewell Health West Michigan as a graduate nurse (GN; pre-licensure), it is expected that the GN will successfully obtain licensure from the State of Michigan and transition into a RN role within 60 days of hire. The GN is removed from the GN role and transitioned to a Nurse Technician (NT) role:

(a) Upon failure of NCLEX within the 60-day period.

(b) At 60 days without completion of NCLEX examination

(c) Failure of the NCLEX two times will result in employment termination and conversion of the grant to a loan.

Yes! We would encourage you to apply for the grant even if you are already a Corewell Health employee.

An element of this program includes the partnership with a coach. The coach is a CHW Registered Nurse (RN) with minimally one year experience. In your first semester, you are partnered with a coach. Your coach will remain the same for the duration of your academic program. Your coach, who you will meet with for 1-2 hours per month, will provide you support throughout your academic program as well as facilitate experiential learning opportunities for you in preparation for your transition in practice at CHW.

Experiential learning opportunities are designed to assist you in your transition into practice. They are not intended to be cumbersome or overwhelming and will require approximately 1 hour of time per month beginning in the second semester of your nursing program. An example includes attending a committee or council meeting (likely virtually) and debriefing on the meeting using a defined debriefing tool.

According to the CHW Nurse Scholars Program criteria, if you are first offered admission into either the KCON Traditional BSN or Accelerated Second Degree BSN program but are granted a deferred start date by the KCON BSN program, you automatically forfeit admission into the CHW Nurse Scholars Program and would need to reapply to the CHW Nurse Scholars Program for the semester when you are starting the KCON BSN program.