Tuition benefit helps nursing leader ‘level up’ her career

When Sheree Rodgers, BSN, RN, CCRN, Safe Patient Handling and Mobility Manager and Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Shared Governance Committee Co-Chair, joined the University of Chicago Medicine from another area healthcare system 16 years ago, she was impressed by how many of her nursing peers were pursuing higher education — a benefit covered in full by their employer.

“I knew about the tuition reimbursement benefit, and I think that’s what draws people here,” Rodgers said. “Everyone was in school. I was like, ‘Oh, I need to level up.’”

Rodgers, who recently moved from the neurointensive care unit at UChicago Medicine to become a safe patient handling and mobility manager, is now finishing up a two-year graduate program focused on nursing leadership.

“One-hundred percent tuition reimbursement really makes it easy for you to get a higher degree if you want it,” Rodgers said, adding that the curriculum has “given me so much more understanding around the business side of being in healthcare and incorporating it with everything I’ve done in my career.”

In addition to work and school, Rodgers holds leadership roles in nursing and governance councils to support her colleagues.

“I feel like UChicago Medicine is the greatest place to work,” she said. “I have excelled in a lot of areas in this organization. They really give nurses room to grow.”