“I was very nervous about going up and presenting, but now that I did it, I feel confident.”
Aeryn Sim breathed a (good) sigh of relief after giving a group presentation for her Pathway to Professional Nursing class in front of nearly 100 aspiring nurses.
Sim is an incoming BS in Nursing (BSN) student at the University of Colorado Anschutz College of Nursing.
The group presentation is one of the final projects she and her classmates at Community College of Aurora (and students at Community College of Denver and Red Rocks Community College) had to complete before starting classes at CU Anschutz Nursing in June. The college has partnerships with the three schools through the Integrated Nursing Pathway, enabling seamless entry into the undergraduate program.
Each project focused on a healthcare-related topic (not necessarily nursing-related), ranging from mental health to racial disparities in childbirth to cancer treatments. Each group integrated and applied the elements of professional nursing practice discussed throughout the semester. Students must identify a vulnerable population and its associated health disparities, examine why these disparities exist, and develop an idea to address them through evidence-based nursing interventions.
“This project is really the culmination of students’ collective knowledge and abilities through practical application of what they have learned about the profession of nursing as they prepare to enter discipline-specific training at CU Anschutz Nursing,” INP Coordinator and Assistant Teaching Professor Lacey Cross, DNP, APRN, FNP-BC, CNE, CHSE, says.
Reed Lawson (fourth from left) and Aeryn Sim (at podium), giving a presentation about mental health. |
Sim’s group focused on mental health.
“My classmate (Reed Lawson) and I have experienced mental health stigma, and we wanted to bring this to light because we know how important it is to advocate for these types of things,” she says. Focusing on mental health is a relatively new thing, and we want to advocate for people’s mental health.”
“We almost did another topic, but we really pushed to focus on mental health because we knew it would be more meaningful and have more of an impact,” Lawson says. “We want to do what we can to educate ourselves and our classmates on it.”
Preparing to Become Nurses
The group projects also encourage students to get a glimpse of what nursing school will look like through collaboration, teamwork, and examining scientific evidence.
“I know sometimes I’ve communicated in a way that hasn’t been effective, so a lot of this project was about learning how to communicate and work together,” Lawson says.
Sim is looking forward to researching and using evidence-based practice when she starts nursing school.
“We’ve learned how to factually back up our claims instead of talking about things we may not know about,” she says.
Incoming nursing students watch their future nursing classmates' presentations. |
The students came to CU Anschutz for their presentations, so it was one of the first times they could meet some of their soon-to-be classmates, see where they’ll be getting an education, and get a feel for the campus.
“I’m excited to meet other undergraduate nursing students; it fills me with joy that so many people are in the program with me. I’m ready to get my hands wet and start doing things, especially clinical rounds. This is such a cool program, and I’d recommend it to anyone,” Lawson says.
“It’s great meeting like-minded people who have the same values and aspirations,” Sim says, who hopes to work in the emergency department or become a psychiatric nurse once she graduates. “Reed and I are both very outgoing, so we feel like we’ve started to make friends with people from other schools. It’s nice to have that ability to grow our circle.”
