SDSU, NSU seek to offer nursing, banking programs

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PIERRE — Two of the public hubs in South Dakota’s higher education system want to help provide more professionals for the healthcare and financial fields.

South Dakota State University seeks to begin offering a nursing-degree program at Northern State University in Aberdeen, while Northern State wants to expand its banking and financial services degree program further in Rapid City and Pierre.

Northern State already offers two-year associate degrees in banking and financial services in those two communities. NSU officials now want to upgrade to four-year bachelor degrees.

The bachelor-degree program has been offered by Northern State in Sioux Falls at the Universities Center campus since 2006.

Northern State also intends to provide its bachelor degree in business administration via the Internet.

The state Board of Regents is scheduled to decide Friday whether to approve the new-site requests. The board is meeting for three days, starting tonight, at South Dakota School of Mines and Technology in Rapid City.

The nursing program, if approved, would start January 2013 and would focus on students who already have bachelor’s degrees in other majors. That same approach proved successful for SDSU in Sioux Falls.

Northern State’s desire to offer banking and financial services courses through Capital University Center in Pierre and through University Center in Rapid City is an attempt to meet expected demand for more professional workers in those fields.

State Division of Banking director Bret Afdahl said he and his staff are strongly supportive of Northern’s efforts. “This expansion will create a greater pipeline of professionals well-prepared to enter the industry,” he said.

The state Department of Labor has forecast that employment would increase by 460 between the years 2008 and 2018 for financial managers, compliance officers, analysts, advisors, underwriters, examiners and sales agents.

Northern’s banking and financial services program first received the regents’ approval in December 2005 and has been gradually expanding because of needs from banks, regulators and others in the finance sector.

If the regents approve, the four-year degrees would become available in spring 2012 at Pierre and Rapid City.

Northern’s plan to offer its business administration degree via the Internet is one of two distance-education requests that the regents will consider this week. SDSU wants to make its sociology degree program available by Internet.

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