By HILLARY COPSEY
Scripps Howard News Service Shawn Blouin started nursing school because he wanted to help people, to share the compassion he witnessed on a missionary trip last summer down the Amazon River.
Job security in a sour economy is just an added bonus for the 22-year-old newlywed from Jensen Beach, Fla. It's a factor attracting more men to the still predominately female field of nursing.
"People are always going to get sick," Blouin said. "I feel very good, very secure in my job choice."
Male graduates from Indian River State College's registered nursing program jumped from about 10 percent of the class in 2004 and 2005 to about 15 percent of graduates in 2006 and 2007. The number of men graduating dipped slightly this year, but 42 men -- 14 percent of all students in the registered nursing program -- are enrolled now.
Only about 5 percent of the nation's nurses were men in 2004, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
"Every time we hit a period of our history in health care where we get a shortage of nurses and our economy is in a recession, we do see more men pursuing nursing as a profession," said Jane Cebelak, director of the nursing program at IRSC.
A national campaign portraying nursing as a manly career also has helped fuel the increase in males seeking nursing degrees, Cebelak said. It doesn't hurt that the national median income for registered nurses was $57,000 in 2004, the most recent statistic from the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
And nurses are sorely needed in Florida and many other states. Florida's health-care industry needs almost 19,000 more registered nurses than are available in the workforce, according to the Florida Center for Nursing. By 2020, that gap is expected to grow to more than 52,000 empty nursing jobs.
"Every single student we've known in the class, they all have jobs (after graduating)," said Shane Abel, a 37-year-old father of two enrolled in IRSC's nursing program. "It's very promising."
Abel and his wife, Stacy, of Port St. Lucie both enrolled at IRSC to become nurses, seeking jobs that would allow them to spend more time with their kids. Abel worked 70 to 80 hours a week as a manager of a Papa John's restaurant before starting school in 2004. He took his last IRSC test before Christmas and will take the state licensing exam in March.
And then Abel hopes to land a local nursing job.
"I'm very fortunate because of the economy that I'm almost done," Abel said.
(Hillary Copsey is a reporter for Scripps Treasure Coast newspapers in Florida.)
