Angela Korver is a good nurse - she wants to be a better nurse.

Korver returned to school last year with the goal of earning her bachelor's of nursing degree from Lewis-Clark State College.

"It's the industry trend that nurses will be required to have their bachelor's degree," said Korver, who earned her associate's degree from North Idaho College in 2003. "I love the education, and the fact I am doing it in my natural setting."

She is one of 27 registered nurses who enrolled in a new nursing cohort program established by Lewis-Clark State College and Kootenai Heath.

"Nurses want to help people," Korver said. "Increasing my education is going to allow me to be able to make a difference in the lives of my patients."

Jan Moseley, director of Nursing Systems, Operations and Innovation at Kootenai, said the hospital's goal is to improve patient outcomes with increased education.

"There are studies that show mortality rates are less, declines in surgical infections and shorter periods of hospitalization with nurses who have their four-year degrees," Moseley said. "Nurses are in the best positions to coordinate patient care because they're here with patients all the time.

It's hard for a nurse who has two years of experience to be the center of a team where everyone else has a graduate degree."

The program is quickly catching on with nurses at Kootenai Health. To date, 30 additional nurses have registered in the LCSC-KH cohort. They will begin classes in the fall. Kootenai employs roughly 540 registered nurses and of those nurses - roughly 40 percent have earned a bachelor's degree.

"We've created a vision and a timetable for 80 percent of nurses to have a bachelor's degree of nursing by 2020," Moseley said. "We want our nurses who have their associate degree from North Idaho College to realize that their two-year degree is a start - not a finish. We want our nurses to continue their education."

As part of the agreement, LCSC reduced tuition costs by 25 percent for Kootenai employees pursuing a bachelor's of nursing degree. The discount doesn't apply to lower general education coursework.

"Lewis-Clark State College responded to the needs of our students and to the expectations of our Coeur d'Alene community," said Cyndie Hammond, the executive director of LCSC-Coeur d'Alene. "Higher education needs to be able to move quickly and adapt to the marketplace. This partnership is a reflection of that spirit, and we're thrilled knowing that the program will grow."

Susan O'Donnell, an LCSC assistant nursing professor, spends a portion of her week at the hospital to provide hands-on instruction.

"Personally, I love being involved with the nurses enrolled in my classes," O'Donnell said. "They are dynamic and motivated. I try and stress to them that we are all lifelong learners - and I think they appreciate that."

Moseley said the college was able to adapt its nursing program, which is delivered online, to meet the needs of the hospital.

"We came up with a hybrid of online courses and classes here," Moseley said. "I think big institutions like hospitals and colleges can be pretty clunky. This is an example of two big institutions not being the status quo. We both said, 'Hey this is where we need to go and this is what we can do to get there.'"