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SALUTE TO NURSES CONT’D
For administrators and teachers, it meant finding new ways students could learn and ultimately prepare themselves for their chosen career. And for those stu- dents ... it meant two and half semesters of adjusting and, as noted earlier, juggling even more balls.
“I think this experience made us stronger and better-prepared for what we’re going to face — and it made us stronger as a unit.”
“Nursing education changed abruptly overnight in the spring of 2020,” Scoble said. “Nursing programs across the nation moved to virtual learning, and clinical experiences were also canceled abruptly as our hospitals, long-term-care facilities, and com- munity agencies — all the affiliates we’re partnered with for our student learning — could no longer take students.”
Elaborating, she said Elms and other schools adjusted to virtual programming and, later, hybrid programming, with the goal of using technology and all available resources to minimize the impact of COVID on a nursing education.
“Even with all the creative solutions, there’s always that question about whether these students would
Kenneth Tanon, a mem- ber of STCC’s Nursing class of 2021, is seen with Lisa Fugiel, dean of Nursing at the school.
be prepared for professional nursing practice and whether they were receiving the same quality of education,” said Scoble. “We actually believe that we provided our nursing students with not only equiva- lent learning experiences, but, in some cases, truly enhanced learning.
“We really maximized the use of technology in the classroom, and we also had virtual clinical experi- ences,” she went on, adding that the goal at Elms was
to make the learning experiences as much like hands- on as possible, when hands-on, at least early in the pandemic, was not an option.
Other administrators we spoke with echoed those sentiments.
“There was a lot of learning on the faculty’s part and a lot of learning on the students’ part — new
Please see Students, page 42