To address the shortage of mental healthcare professionals in Kentucky, OneQuest Health and Northern Kentucky University are putting $100,000 in scholarships to develop the next generation of counselors.
The funding, awarded through the Kentucky Council on Postsecondary Education’s Healthcare Workforce Investment Fund, will directly support students in NKU’s Master of Science in Clinical Mental Health Counseling program.
The partnership, which was awarded its full request of a $50,000 match (totaling $100,000 with the healthcare partner’s contribution), is an effort to directly funnel talent into a high-need area of the healthcare sector. Since the inception of the Healthcare Workforce Investment Fund, OneQuest Health has leveraged $300,000 in funding to address mental healthcare workforce development in the region.
“We see this partnership with Northern Kentucky University as a game-changer,” said Rick Wurth, OneQuest Health CEO, in a press release. “It’s incredibly important and truly distinctive for a provider like OneQuest Health to be collaborating directly with a state university to tackle the critical workforce shortages we face in mental healthcare. We are proud to be leading this effort for the Commonwealth.”
The scholarship program responds to the legislative intent of the Healthcare Workforce Investment Fund, which is to grow the state’s healthcare workforce.
“This partnership ensures that more qualified, compassionate mental healthcare workers can enter the field at a time when demand has never been greater,” said Gannon Tagher, dean of NKU’s College of Health and Human Services in the release. “We are incredibly grateful for this continued investment in our students and in Kentucky’s mental health workforce.”
The partnership will be formally recognized at the Healthcare Workforce Investment Fund Awards Program on Dec. 9 during the Healthcare Workforce Collaboratory in Lexington.