WIN-A-STEP-UP Program

About Us

The Challenge

Nurse aides provide 80-90% of direct care to North Carolina’s nursing home residents, but have a 117% yearly turnover rate. Turnover interrupts caregiver-resident relationships, increases staffing shortages and costs, and — most importantly—endangers quality of care to our state’s nursing home residents.

About WIN A STEP UP

WIN A STEP UP educateed and supported career nurses aides and frontline supervisors and charge personnel working in nursing homes throughout the state of North Carolina.

WIN A STEP UP stands for Workforce Improvement for Nursing Assistants: Supporting Training, Education, and Payment for Upgrading Performance.

The WIN A STEP UP program was created through a partnership with the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services and the UNC Institute on Aging. WIN A STEP UP was aimed at examining and improving the situation of nursing assistants in the long-term care industry in North Carolina.

In the pilot phase, the primary objective was to conduct a comprehensive assessment of the current situation of nursing assistants and to develop educational and incentive programs to improve job quality and reduce turnover in various sectors of the long term care workforce, including nursing homes, adult care homes, home health, home care and hospice settings.

The second phase of the WIN A STEP UP program, improved job quality and increased the retention of nursing assistants through the implementation of an educational and reward system in nursing home settings. Our second phase includeed nursing homes, but many of the lessons learned here may be applied to other long term care settings.