2016 Scholarship Winner

Something is missing, I thought. Tilting my head, I squinted at the ceiling. “But what?” I asked. I could not put my finger on it. It was a slow day at my unit at Lutheran Medical Center and, coincidently, my lunch break, which gave me plenty of time to ponder.

“Code Blue at 4D. Code Blue at 4D,” the overhead blared.

Code Blue at… I popped up from my seat, that’s us!

I threw on my volunteer jacket, clipped on my ID badge, and rushed out of the nurses’ station desk.

Footsteps thundered down the hallways; nurses coming from all directions made their way into a patient’s room, and trailing right behind them were the physicians.

Nurse Rose halted in her tracks and waved me over, “Mabel, I need to you do something for me, okay? You know what’s going on?”

I gave a sharp nod. “Yes, someone’s undergoing cardiac arrest.”

“Good. I’m gonna need you to get the crash cart ASAP, do you remember where it is?”

Nodding once more, I dashed through the hallways and down the flights of stairs to fetch the cart. Without delay, taking long strides, I wheeled it to 4D and watched the nurses work their magic. While Nurse Rose grabbed prefilled syringes of epinephrine, Nurse Ling seized automated external defibrillator pads and gel. Everything was in a frenzy, chaotic yet controlled.

As I stepped back to observe what was happening in front of me, I felt such admiration. Working beside the team of nurses for several months and witnessing how they were the first ones at the scene made me want to be part of this, a part of their team. Because of them, I aspire to become a registered nurse and something more… But what?

After an exhilarating day of volunteering (the patient’s cardiac rhythm stabilized), I began walking home. With my earbuds on, I hummed to the music on my phone’s playlist. Just as Ed Sheeran’s “Thinking Out Loud” played, I paused in my steps and remembered that I too had been thinking about something. After a beat, I blew out a breath.

Well, darn. I thought. I still don’t know what’s missing.

And resumed walking.

Several months later, I found myself in a park.

“Ms. Mabel! Ms. Mabel! Catch me! Try to catch me!” giggled one of my very enthusiastic first-graders, Joe, as he zoomed past me and dove into the sandbox.

Shaking my head, I chuckled, “Joe, please be careful!”

It was an incredibly beautiful day outside and I had decided to treat my summer day camp students to an excursion to the park near our school after a grueling morning of learning how to subtract double digit numbers by drawing pictures. Wandering around the playground, I immersed myself in the matrix of carefree laughter. Just as I was about to return to my bench, wails erupted from the slides. In a flash, I rushed in the direction of the cries and found wo of my students on the ground with tears pouring down their faces.

“Vicky! Naomi! What happened?! Are you guys okay?” I asked as I kneeled and wiped away their tears.

Naomi huffed, “She bumped into me!”

“No!” hiccupped Vicky, “You bumped into me first!”

As they bickered back and forth, I took the opportunity to scan their faces and noticed swelling on their foreheads.

I need something that would reduce the swelling. Looking around the park, my eyes honed in on the cooler I had brought to store my students’ lunches. I tore across the playground and grabbed two ice packs from the cooler. Once I placed them against the girls’ foreheads, we sat together on the grass and played multiple rounds of “I Spy” to pass time.

After, I asked them attentively, “Better?”

“Better!” Naomi and Vicky grinned. With that, they threw down their ice packs and ran after one another; shrieks and mirth filled the playground once again.

As the girls scurried away, a thought hit me.

This is it. I realized as I smiled into the distance, I want to work with children. This was the missing piece.

On that day, I decided to pursue a career in pediatric nursing. Although I still volunteer at my local hospitals, I continue to devote every summer at the day camp center. Spending time with my students has allowed me to be more heedful and quick to tend to their needs, both of which are vital characteristics of pediatric nurses. Overall, working with and caring for the well-being of children has long been one of the major motivators in my desire to attend this institution, which led me to enroll at New York University College of Nursing (NYUCN).

As a nursing student at NYU, I would be under the tutelage of adroit professors and clinical instructors who are unafraid to challenge their pupils and teach with perseverance. Since I want to pursue a career in pediatric nursing, it will definitely be a privilege to work under Ms. Karla Rodriguez, a clinic instructor and registered nurse at NYUCN, who specializes in pediatrics. With her and the rest of the faculty’s guidance, I will be more than prepared to tend to the needs of individuals when I am performing clinical rotations. Also, at NYUCN’s cutting- edge Clinical Simulation Learning Center, I will engage in many hands-on practices. Working with the latest models of Human Patient Simulators and Standardized Patients, I can interact with them as if they are patients in a hospital setting.

In addition, not only do I hope to have a positive impact on my patients one day, but I also wish to reach out to the volunteers who devote their time providing assistance to medical staffs. When I volunteered for the nursing staffs at my local hospitals, I was awed and inspired by their confident and caring attitudes. I want to be a role model for youth volunteers as well. Having the privilege of being an inspirational figure to them and paving a pathway for their journey to become nurses are just two of the biggest rewards as a nurse.