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The School of Nursing Newsletter - From the Office of Dean Patricia Starck
April 24, 2009
We had an outstanding visit by Dr. Kenneth Shine, Executive Vice Chancellor for Health Affairs at UT System last Friday, April 17. This is his annual visit to hear what is going on and what issues we have and how System can be helpful. Our various components gave reports as to our status, and at lunch time, Dr. Shine met with a group of students from each of the Schools. Our nursing students, Rose Triantafilia and Toby Meyers told me afterwards, they expressed their satisfaction with things in our School but did suggest the students needed more exposure to the electronic medical record. I investigated further and to my surprise learned that in most of the hospitals, students are not allowed to “chart” because they would need a password and about a week’s worth of training with the electronic record system. And since our nursing students are usually in different clinical agencies each semester, they aren’t there long enough to warrant passwords. (They do have access to view the record, but usually cannot enter their data.) Instead, they write out their assessments by hand and the instructor checks them. Some of the students have told me that sometimes their preceptor nurse lets them chart in the electronic record, and they are grateful for every experience. I also learned that we do have some simulated experiences in our lab. At any rate, we intend to set something more up in the simulation lab that will let students gain proficiency in this area. The experts in the School of Health Information Sciences will be assisting us.
We received a congratulatory letter from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board this week telling us that we were one of only 13 (out of 90 nursing schools in the state) to achieve both the minimum graduation rate of 85% and the NCLEX minimum pass rate of 85% for entry level BSN students. Kudos go to our faculty and staff who work extremely hard to bring out the best in our bright students. We were informed that this now makes us eligible for recognition under the Performance Initiative. To be considered we are to demonstrate a best practice with data collection and analysis of a specific strategy that has contributed to our success, and we must submit a plan for disseminating information across the state. The Commissioner of Higher Education will make the final determination. A recognized program will be posted on the Board’s website and be eligible for incentive funding.
The 2010 rankings for graduate nursing schools by US News and World Report is out this week. I’m pleased to say that we maintained our ranking of being in the top 5% of schools—19th of 395. Our program in geriatrics ranked in the top 10, specifically in position # 8. These distinctions are a credit to our excellent faculty and our outstanding students. Congratulations, all!
The Academic and Administrative Leadership Development Program under the leadership of Dr. Max Buja hosted a program on “How to Put Leadership into Action” with guest speaker Dr. Sarah Weddington, a lawyer, professor, Women’s Rights Advocate, and author of the bestseller, “A Question of Choice”, a memoir of her experience arguing the Roe v. Wade case. It was a lesson in content of as well as style of delivery. She “planted” questions in the audience to promote interaction and make sure all the points were covered, but without giving a straight lecture for 45 minutes. She told lots of stories, which is a technique she recommends to make the point and to help people remember.
We had the second of the UT Talks series on Wednesday, April 22 with Dr. Carmel Dyer and Dr. Sharon Ostwald presenting on the topic of “Aging America—Can we handle the demand?” The talks were very informative and interesting and everyone came away with new insights, not only about healthy aging, but about the problems and challenges at a system level as the baby boomers hit 65years and older. Dr. Kathleen Pace-Murphy from our School moderated the Question and Answer period.
Today was the culmination of 2 ½ years of hard work by the Doctor of Nursing Practice students and faculty, as the students presented their capstone projects as well as displayed their posters. We had deliberately chosen students from around the state for the first class, so we could “seed” the various geographic areas with DNP graduates. The nine students are from Houston, Sugar Land, Dallas, Waco, McAllen, and Amarillo. Their scholarly projects presented related to sepsis, stroke, women and heart failure, starting a unique clinic with house calls, introducing aesthetic medicine into a primary care clinic, an incentivized quality initiative program for acute care nurse practitioners, diabetes prevention in children, the use of motivational interviewing with diabetic patients, and interdisciplinary care in the elderly diabetic patient. Their work validated that this is a clinical/practice focused doctorate with a high standard of academic scholarship. Much credit goes to Dr. Joanne Hickey, the founder and Coordinator of the DNP program and to the outstanding faculty who have worked to make the program a national model.
Olubunmi (Boomie) Cardoso, one of our BSN/generic students, will receive a $1,000 scholarship at the annual Fort Bend County Black Nurses Association (FBCBNA) Banquet/Ball on April 25. On April 18, the FBCBNA hosted a Nursing Career Day seminar entitled “Nursing: The Key to Your Future” at the Stimley-BlueRidge Library. Boomie spoke to the students about student life, and Dr. Mary Ellen Ross talked about what the students can do now to prepare for nursing school, as well as the required coursework in the nursing curriculum.
I had the opportunity to have dinner this week with the Student Governance officers and honorees. From the School of Nursing were Paige Bentley, Sheryl Guiney, Eric Brown, Stephani Dalhaus, and Carita Nolan (who received a scholarship award). We had a chance to talk about career plans and life in general from the student perspective. It made me appreciate all the more what interesting and bright people are entering the nursing profession. We will be in good hands.
Thanks to all the SON faculty, staff, and students who are signed up to walk in the March for Babies this Sunday, April 26. I understand that our undergraduate students did a great job creating a SON T-shirt, and we have sold 56, the proceeds of which will be donated to the event. Thanks also to those who gave donations for this worthy cause.
Have a great week end.
Dean Starck
