Federal grants aim to boost nursing faculty pay and ease classroom shortages
S. 3707 — Nurse Faculty Shortage Reduction Act of 2026 · Filed by Richard Durbin (D-IL) · 1 cosponsor · Introduced Jan 27, 2026 · Referred to committee
Your members of Congress
Enter a ZIP to see where your representative and both senators stood on this bill.
Looked up on this device — your ZIP is never stored on our servers.
What it does
This bill creates a federal grant program that pays nursing schools up to $15 million per year (2027–2031) to supplement the salaries of nursing faculty members, aiming to make teaching positions more competitive with clinical nursing jobs and reduce faculty shortages. Schools can receive grants for up to 3 years to boost faculty pay to match what nurses earn in clinical practice, with priority given to schools in underserved areas or serving vulnerable populations.
Why we flagged it
The bill is a targeted federal grant program designed to address a specific labor-market failure (nursing faculty shortage) by subsidizing salaries at accredited nursing schools. It is a direct public investment in healthcare workforce capacity, not a tax provision, deregulation, or commemorative measure.
What the text implies
- The program's 3-year sunset may create a cliff: schools that build faculty positions and curriculum around grant-funded salaries may face budget crises when federal support ends, unless they secure alternative funding or reduce faculty.
- By tying grants to the difference between clinical nursing salaries and faculty salaries, the program implicitly accepts and reinforces the wage gap between clinical and academic nursing—it does not address root causes of why teaching pays less.
The full analysis lists 4 implications of this text.
Who stands to gain
accredited nursing schools; nursing faculty members (direct salary supplement); healthcare systems (indirectly, via increased nursing graduate supply)