For the past 6 years, I have had the privilege of teaching in the Rutgers-Camden School Nurse Certificate Program. I am a full-time school nurse in the Camden City School District during the school year, but each summer I wear my favorite hat, that of school nurse educator. I honor the efforts of my students and marvel at their courage, many having not been in the role of student for many, many years. My students are adult learners, professional nurses who want to enter the unknown world of school nursing.
Being a school nursing educator makes me especially #Relentless! It is a daunting challenge and responsibility to teach new school nurses. My goal is to share the cutting edge of school nursing practice with my students. I am in awe of their dedication to glean as much information as they can in the brief time we spend in class together. I see a very bright future for school nursing because these students are entering their independent specialty practice armed with knowledge, experience and an understanding of 21st Century School Nursing Practice thanks to NASN’s Framework.
As a #Relentless school nurse and educator, I am also a life-long learner, always looking for evidence-based tools to share with my students. I return over and over again to the incredible resources on the National Association of School Nurses – NASN’s website! During a recent class, we took a brief walk through the Back to School Health Office Toolkit: http://www.nasn.org/nasn/nasn-resources/professional-topics/bts
Check out these helpful lists:
- For School Nurses – Back to School Checklist for School Nurses
- For Parents/Guardians – Back to School Family Checklist
One of the unique aspects of the Rutgers-Camden School Nurse Certificate Program is that the Faculty are still full-time school nurses. I believe in the power of storytelling as a pedagogical tool and I am armed with 18 years of school nursing stories! Being a relentless school nurse and educator is challenging, thrilling and one of my greatest honors.
Have you ever taught school nursing? How did you feel knowing that you were impacting someone’s practice?
How are you a Relentless School Nurse?
Robin, I don’t know how you keep managing to strike a chord in my School Nursing heart with your blog postings. With retirement looming close on the horizon and as part of my practice, I have always tried to reach out to parents of my students who are BSNs (required in Baltimore County) and tried to recruit them into School Nursing. Also, this is addressed during mentoring of student Nurses. Many have never considered School Nursing as a viable career choice. So yes, I will continue to be a #relentless recruiter as long as I can.
My one dream is that School Nursing becomes a Masters in Nursing option at some University somewhere offering online education and preceptorships in a student’s local school district. Wouldn’t that spur career RN’s to seek an MSN as a validation for being a life long professional learner in search of a career? Can you imagine Nurses coming to the school table to be hired already educated and credentialed? What a professional workforce we would have!
Stay #relentless, Robin and thank you! And thanks to NASN for their Back to School Checklists!
Thank you for your heartfelt message Donna. I am so inspired and appreciative by what you shared!
Rutgers-Camden School of Nursing has added a pathway to MSN in School Health Services! This was part of the grant that we worked on over the course of 18 months. Our first cohort in the newly redesigned program started in May. Our program is not online, I have mixed feelings about teaching school nursing online. There is something magical that happens face to face in class, but I understand that it does work well in some programs.