Our Story
Mission
Centralized Clinical Placement System (CCPS) is a simple to use yet powerful tool focused on supporting regional capacity and placement needs to streamline nursing and allied health clinical placements and streamlining compliance tracking.
CCPS was developed by the Foundation for California Community Colleges, aligning with their mission to benefit, support, and enhance the mission of the California Community College system and to expand student access, success, and educational and career outcomes through the development of student-centered resources and tools.
The Beginning
In the early 2000s, the Bay Area found itself faced with a nursing shortage. Health care providers, nursing educators, and the Foundation responded, building a technology tool that would expand regional collaboration and go on to strengthen nursing education across the nation.
In 2003, California’s aging and expanding population combined with the subsequent growing demand for nurses led to the state’s ratio of registered nurses per capita being the lowest in the nation. The problem was particularly acute in the San Francisco Bay Area due to its tremendous growth. Nursing education programs faced faculty shortages and capacity constraints, in part due to the limited number of clinical placements they could offer students, and these constraints resulted in student admission of only 45% of qualified applicants. Educating 70% of California’s new registered nurses each year, the California Community Colleges were poised to be part of the solution.
Taking Action
Responding to this nursing shortage, the California Health Care Foundation awarded a grant to HealthImpact (previously the California Institute for Nursing & Health Care). Gleaning insights from nurses and other medical experts, HealthImpact worked to develop strategies for building and expanding nursing education capacity. Their team partnered with the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and asked:
How could we leverage technology to increase nursing student enrollment while simultaneously streamlining the clinical placement process?
Funded by a generous grant from the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation, an advisory committee was formed in October 2004 to respond, resulting in an idea that would help improve the state’s nursing education infrastructure: the Centralized Clinical Placement System (CCPS). Leveraging this investment, the Foundation for California Community Colleges joined the taskforce and partnered with HealthImpact to develop this pioneering tool.
Regional Pilot
After months of development, the Foundation launched the CCPS pilot program in 2005. CCPS aggregated school and clinical provider information in an online tool that centralized communication and exposed untapped clinical opportunities, enabling schools and clinical providers to achieve a higher level of operating performance. With CCPS, colleges rapidly match clinical placement needs to provider availabilities.
CCPS was integral to strengthening and improving nursing education across the state, providing California nurses access to clinical hours and the skills, knowledge, and training needed to earn their degrees. By 2009, new nursing student enrollment in the Bay Area specifically had increased by 47% and student clinical hours more than doubled.
Expanding Nationally
Today, CCPS provides simple scheduling, detailed reports on previous placements, and increased clinical and allied health opportunities. In 2019, the tool was expanded to include easy compliance tracking, ensuring clinical sites can easily define standard and custom rotation requirements, and schools can efficiently manage student and faculty compliance.