DOWNTOWN BROOKLYN — Supriya Sarker, a rising senior studying nursing at St. Francis College in downtown Brooklyn, decided to make health care her life’s work as she watched her father Joydev die of COVID-19.
“The last few days I spent with him (in the hospital), he told me one thing. He did tell me, ‘The nurses here are amazing,’ ” Sarker recalled.
Looking at the care and concern the nurses had for her father, Sarker decided to become one of them. And so she enrolled in St. Francis College whose nursing program she had heard good things about. She said her goal is to someday work in a critical care unit in a hospital.
Sarker and her fellow nursing students were thrilled when St. Francis College’s nursing program recently got a major stamp of approval from the Commission on Collegiate Nursing Education (CCNE), the agency the U.S. Department of Education entrusts with inspecting nursing programs in colleges and universities and accrediting them.
CCNE granted St. Francis College a 10-year accreditation — a designation akin to the federal government giving the college a pat on the back for a job well done, college officials said. It allows the college to continue to offer its nursing program to students for the next 10 years. It also makes the program eligible for federal grants.
The accreditation process, which took about a year to complete, included site inspections by CCNE officials and self-evaluations by the college’s nursing program administrators. A lot of paperwork had to be completed, as well.
Among the points St. Francis College made was that more than 80% of the students who come through the nursing program go on to pass the National Council Licensure Examination (NCLEX), the test prospective nurses must pass to obtain their license.
“It’s so exciting for students,” Sarker said of the 10-year accreditation, “because we’ve seen how our professors worked so hard for it. We knew it was accreditation season. We saw everybody (from CCNE) coming. We all knew this was important.”
The college’s nursing program includes a simulation lab containing a hospital-like setting with beds filled with mannequins resembling patients in need of care.
The program also has partnerships with several hospitals — including New York Presbyterian, Mount Sinai, Brooklyn Hospital and Wyckoff Hospital — that provide internships that give students the chance for hands-on training under the guidance of professionals in the field.
The accreditation is important to St. Francis College for many reasons, not the least of which is the fact that nursing is one of the largest programs at the college, said Mary Kate Kasler, chairperson of the nursing department. Between 25% and 30% of the college’s students are nursing majors, she noted. During the 2024-2025 academic year, 300 students were enrolled in the nursing program.
Kasley said the accreditation is validation for the college and its nursing program.
“I think the thing about St. Francis College is its sense of community, and many students find that they feel like they’re home when they come to St Francis,” she said. “We really try to provide them with that transition from high school to college with that extra support. Nursing is a rigorous program to take on as a major.
“We want to be there to facilitate student success.”
St. Francis College President Tim Cecere, who called the nursing program, “the jewel in the crown of the college,” said the program is important to the college’s mission.
“What the nursing program provides is in line with our charism and our commitment to our mission which is to serve the community, and there’s no better way that we can provide an example of serving the community than that program,” he said.