National Nurse March update

We have great news to share with you about the National Nurse proposal since our last newsletter.

The American Association of Community Colleges has invited the team to speak at their annual convention on April 23rd in Long Beach, California. Public health nurses in the Orange County vicinity expressed interest in hearing the presentation, and we are pleased that they are working to make this happen.

On March 31st, the team will be traveling to Mt. Wachusetts Community College located in Gardner, Massachusetts to keynote a statewide nursing conference hosted by the health program deans of the fifteen Massachusetts community colleges. This conference is free to the public and if you are interested in attending, please email teri@nationalnurse.info.

Lillian Gonzalez RN from Nevada spoke to the student nurse leaders of Oregon, keynoting their dinner meeting on February 23rd. Student nurses attending were very supportive and inspired about having an Office of the National Nurse. The team continues to hear from students around the country who are integrating the proposal into their projects, papers, and research.

Teri and Alisa also presented the initiative at the OSNA Convention and again at the OR Council of Associate Degree Programs.

The National Nurse is receiving much attention in the media as well. You can read about it in the Oregon Student Nursing Association Newsletter http://www.oregonsna.org/newsletter/newsletter4.pdf , the Vermont Nursing Connection
http://nursingald.com/uploads/newsletters/VT042006.pdf , the Utah Public Health Administration Newsletter www.upha.org/html/newsletters/pdf/current.pdf and the Minnesota Department of Public Health Newsletter
http://www.health.state.mn.us/divs/chs/phn/phnnews/phnnews0206.html

The American Journal of Nursing also highlighted the grassroots efforts for a National Nurse on page 86 in their March 2006 edition alongside the article about Michigan's first chief nurse executive, Jeanette Wrona Klemczak.

One of our supporters thought it would be great to start modeling what the Office of the National Nurse would do to educate the public on ways to live healthy. Thanks to Kathlynn Northrup-Snyder, RN, CNS, PhD from Oregon who set the tone for beginning this activity by encouraging all nurses to first care for themselves and their wellness. Please send the team your tips for the public’s health, with documentation, your state, and title for us to publish on line and in this newsletter.

In order to fund the educational activities by the team, we have created a four page fundraising letter to send to individuals and organizations interested in helping the team travel to educate others about the National Nurse proposal. Please email teri@nationalnurse.info if you have ideas about where the team can send our donation letter. The on line contribution link can be found at www.nationalnurse.org and there is also updated merchandise available at www.cafepress.com/nationalnurse.

Please continue to spread the word about the National Nurse. Thank-you for signing the petition to create an Office of the National Nurse and for submitting your emails to receive this newsletter.

Until next time,
Teri, Alisa, and Terri