Second nursing intake offered for the first time at Toi Ohomai

Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology in Rotorua. Photo / File

Toi Ohomai Institute of Technology is offering a second intake for its Bachelor of Nursing course for the first time.

Prior to the merger with Bay of Plenty Polytechnic, Waiariki Institute of Technology only ever provided an annual intake in January for the course.

Group manager nursing Brighid McPherson said in a statement the decision to offer a second intake was made to accommodate those who had missed out on the first one earlier in the year.

"We are offering this in response to a number of late applications in the first quarter of 2019. We wanted them to be able to complete year one of the Bachelor of Nursing and join year two in January 2020.

"It's a great opportunity for people who missed out earlier in the year so I urge who wanted to sign up but missed the deadline to do so now."

McPherson said the added bonus would be more registered nurses when the students completed the course in 2021.

"The more opportunities we offer students to start and complete a programme of study, the more nurses we will produce. Currently, the demand for qualified, registered nurses is very high and many places are finding it hard to fill vacancies.

"The flipside of this is that figures show employment among newly registered nurses is extremely high. Last year, 98 per cent of our graduates received job offers after receiving their Nursing State Finals results."

Students in the second intake would need to complete all components of the course by January 2020 to start Year 2 with those from this year's first one.

Anyone wanting to apply for the second intake can now do so on the website with a start date of 3 June. Normal Bachelor of Nursing criteria apply.