Hoping for a surge in the number of certified nurses across Arkansas, state and local leaders celebrated Monday's grand opening of the new Nursing and Science Center at the University of Arkansas Community College.

"It's great because it's going to help our state provide the nurses that we desperately need," Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders said during the midday ceremony and ribbon cutting at the new facility, adding that experts project the country will need 300,000 more nurses by the end of the decade.

The 35,000 square foot, two-story facility includes classrooms, lounge areas for students to study and multiple science and nursing labs. Some of those labs are decked out to emulate a hospital setting, and include life-like mannequins that blink, cough and talk with students as t

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