May 2019
Haley
Lewis
Edgecombe Community College
Rocky Mount
,
NC
United States

 

 

 

Haley has demonstrated compassion in multiple situations throughout her senior year. Most recently, while precepting in labor and delivery, Haley showed compassion by assisting a family through a very emotional and difficult delivery. Haley showed great compassion with this family throughout the birth experience, which they gratefully acknowledged at the time of discharge. Her preceptor stated that Haley maintained her professionalism--and her emotions--and handled the situation better that some very experienced nurses could've done. People always say you have to have compassion to be a good nurse, but it takes a very special kind of compassion to care for families in the deepest, darkest time of their life. Another example of compassion, as well as advocacy, that Haley has shown is through a program she founded called The New Eagles Project which is an organization that collects and distributes toys and/ or food to be donated to children and families through the Department of Social Services. As the founder for this organization, Haley developed opportunities for fund raising to collect toys and food for disadvantaged children in Nash and Edgecombe counties during her senior year. Although this is not an example of clinical compassion and advocacy, it does address the holistic needs of our communities' children which, in turn, has a trickledown effect on their health and happiness.
Haley's leadership and team collaboration skills are evident in the classroom, clinical and societal settings. During her senior year, she was the president of the Student Nurses Association (SNA) for ECC Nursing. She has been active in fundraising for the SNA and in community service every semester while in nursing school (for example, she organized fund raisers within the SNA to collect toys for the local Boys and Girls clubs, and she was a Team Leader for our nursing students this fall at the Nash county American Heart Association-Heart Walk for which her team raised $1780.00 for the American Heart Association). During her senior year, Haley was also chosen to be the senior class representative, which provided her the opportunity to be a liaison between the senior nursing students and the nursing faculty. Her leadership, communication, and advocacy skills, and compassion for the needs of others were all characteristics that were greatly valued in this role.