HTN students learn from role models
The Practical Nursing program at Lee County High Tech Center North prepares students to be excellent care givers. A portion of the 1350 hour instructional program introduces the students to people who were instrumental to the medical and nursing profession development. Instructor Robin Randolph, RN, doesn’t just talk about the people who made history in the nursing profession, she encourages her students to live the part of selected role models.
Recently the class of twenty four students in the freshman class drew names and then researched the person they had selected. An educational presentation was expected with visual aids from each nursing student and several students came in costume…and in character…of their role model.
As each presenter approached the front of the class they slipped into character and explained in first person what it was like to make progress in their profession, often against great odds.
Students learned about well known people like Joseph Lister, Louis Pasteur, Clara Barton and Florence Nightingale. Students were also fascinated when their peers presented stories about Saint Marcella, a woman who donated her estate to care of indigent patients and Dorothea Dix, who was an early reformer of mental health institutions.
The students educated their peers with stories about Ignaz Semmelweis, who instituted hand washing protocols to reduce infection and disease and Linda Richards, who was one of the first nurses to graduate from a college.
All these earlier health practitioners overcame adversity and became important breakthrough role models in the health care programs. As students broadened their understanding of the history of the health care industry they became better aware of their role in it. The stories about the lives, and even the deaths, of these sometimes no-too-well-known individuals was interesting and challenging to the current students.