The Op-Ed Nurses, Donna Gaffney and Teri Mills, skillfully crafted another Op-Ed, offering a framing that feels both clarifying and deeply necessary. We are all familiar with the structure of American government: As they reminded readers, Congress writes the laws, the president enforces them, and the courts interpret them. That architecture is foundational. But, as… Continue reading The Relentless School Nurse: The Fourth Branch of Government Is the People

Schools do not control the national climate. But we absolutely control how we lead within it. Across the country, immigration enforcement activity is intersecting with school communities in visible ways, near apartment complexes, at bus stops, and in neighborhoods where our students live. Children do not experience these moments as policy debates. They experience them… Continue reading The Relentless School Nurse: What Schools Owe Children in Uncertain Times – A reflection on leadership, school climate, and the responsibility to protect childhood

  The drawing looks simple on the surface, but look deeper, this was created by a five-year-old child held in an immigration detention center.  Across the country, children are trying to make sense of instability with the only tools they have: paper, pencils, pictures, and words. In Dilley, Texas, children detained with their parents at… Continue reading The Relentless School Nurse: When Childhood Becomes Conditional – Detention, Fear, and Empty Desks

Something is happening. In New Jersey, a grandmother and veteran nurse wrote about standing in line for the polio vaccine as a child and fearing what happens when vaccination rates begin to slip. In Florida, a state leader for Grandparents for Vaccines urged families to protect children through evidence-based immunization and intergenerational responsibility. In South… Continue reading The Relentless School Nurse: When Voice Meets Structure – The Next Chapter for Grandparents for Vaccines

After I published What Schools Witness When Children Are Taken, I heard from school nurses who recognized the scene immediately. The absence that appears without explanation, without coordination, without closure. The archived health record has no transfer destination. The medications are still sitting in the cabinet. The care plan that remains in the system even… Continue reading The Relentless School Nurse: The Accumulation We Rarely Name – Moral Injury