For all the wonderful things associated with the announced partnership earlier this week between Hackensack Meridian Health and Monmouth University — an agreement that will provide greater career opportunities and access to health care for the Monmouth students — one aspect may eventually stand out.
HMH will place a representative within the Marjorie K. Unterberg School of Nursing and Health Studies at Monmouth to help foster the successful placement of students and new graduates in internship and employment opportunities with Hackensack Meridian Health.
The person has not been identified. Nor has the exact title (coordinator … liaison — take your pick). The role, however, is clear, Monmouth President Patrick Leahy said.
“That person can continually feed us information about what our curriculum needs to focus on so that we are preparing the health care workers for the for the future that Hackensack Meridian and our community need,” Leahy said. “This is a great example of how industry and education can collaborate more fully to make sure that our students have top-shelf outcomes and are best prepared for the work world they will enter.”
HMH CEO Bob Garrett couldn’t agree more.
“It’s a unique idea,” he said. “I don’t know of any other health systems that have a position located permanently on the campus of a major university.”
For Garrett, the position — and the partnership — align with the vision he has long held, one that makes him a global thought leader.
“Our mission is to transform health care,” he said. “I think the way to do that is through partnerships. We can’t do everything ourselves. And we shouldn’t try to do everything ourselves.
“We always want to create a team of health care providers, because health care really is a team sport.”
HMH will look to the partnership to help it increase its bench of talent, Garrett said.
“We’re facing a critical shortage of nursing and allied health professionals,” he said. “By having partnerships with organizations like Monmouth University, that can really help us.”
The nursing and allied health professional students, Garrett said, will be able to get practical experience, serving in rotations throughout the HMH landscape.
Of course, this is just the beginning.
Leahy said the goal will be to grow the partnership — something else the on-campus liaison will help facilitate. This matches the vision and mission of Monmouth.
“When I came here five years ago, we decided that we wanted to create a health care juggernaut in our community — to grow the programs that we had in health care, in the health sciences, and to add, where it makes sense, additional programs.
“We’ve tried really hard to do that.
Expanding access
The affiliation between Hackensack Meridian Health and Monmouth University will provide for collaboration on health and wellness education and outreach for students and offers after-hours urgent care options for the university community.
HMH also will provide direct health services as part of the agreement, which establishes Hackensack Meridian Urgent Care Centers in Eatontown and Neptune as preferred urgent care options for students, faculty and staff when the university’s Health Center is not open.
In support of its commitment to Monmouth students, Hackensack Meridian Health will offer a limited number of discounted rideshare vouchers to ensure that transportation to those facilities is not a barrier to care.
“The bottom line is, we need a comprehensive partnership with the leading health care provider in our community in order to make that happen. It’s one of the reasons I’m so excited about this partnership.”
Having two key partners in New Jersey should help do one more key thing: Grow the talent pool in the state.
“Just like we do with our new medical school, we want people to stay in New Jersey,” he said. “We want to train people to help us take care of our community. That’s a big piece of this.”
Keeping people out of the system is a big piece, too, Garrett said.
Officials from Hackensack Meridian Health and Monmouth will partner on community education, including annual student-centric wellness programming.
And as part of the agreement, HMH also secured exclusive naming rights for the addition of a student wellness center that is part of a planned expansion of OceanFirst Bank Center, scheduled to open in 2026.
The expansion adds 22,745 square feet of health and fitness space to the university’s existing fitness center and includes state-of-the-art upgrades to the university’s sports medicine facilities.
