By now, we are well aware of the World Health Organization (WHO) designation of 2020 as the Year of the Nurse and Midwife, so named to recognize the 200th anniversary of the birth of Florence Nightingale. Plans for celebration are already in place throughout the world to honor the vision and contributions of Nightingale and to acknowledge our own strengths as nurses leading health care, often one patient at a time. Many of your schools may have already planned activities to celebrate.
Although it is tempting to offer suggestions in multiples of 20 or even 200 about how to recognize nurse educators and nursing students, I will opt for 10 ways in which you can expand the horizons of your school's recognition and celebration. I firmly believe that we can use this year of celebration to extend our influence in our local and global communities.
1. Recognize those in your community who have supported nursing education, including politicians, administrators, nursing service leaders, and, importantly, donors.
2. Make certain your local leaders know how your students are addressing the WHO sustainable development goals to contribute to a better world for all.
3. Highlight the community activities of your faculty and students, including, for example, health fairs, free clinics, and other service-learning projects, and offer to launch new community-based projects throughout the year. These could be launched as partnerships between schools of nursing with nurse colleagues in care delivery systems or community groups.
4. Secure an ad in your local newspaper, highlighting the work of your faculty and students.
5. Have one of your faculty members write an op-ed for a local or national newspaper addressing the value of nurses and the need for educating more nurses to address the health of our nation.
6. Negotiate to have nursing students and faculty profiles on a public billboard, for example, in the airport or on a busy freeway.
7. Initiate a scholarship drive to ensure support for future generations of nursing students.
8. Ask your religious or cultural leaders to recognize nursing throughout the year, offering talking points for them to highlight the contributions of your faculty and students.
9. Teach your students the art of storytelling, to highlight the values of narrative nursing for empowering nurses and recognizing the day-to-day contributions of nurses everywhere, for all patients and families.
10. Think forward. Designated by WHO as the Year of the Nurse and Midwife, 2020 also provides an opportunity to think about a new decade of nursing. The year 2021 will be celebrated as the year of the American nurse in honor of the 125th anniversary of the American Nurses Association.
Importantly, the strides we make in 2020 can be used as the launch pad for changing the image of nursing locally, nationally, and globally, to provide the public with an even more positive view of the most trusted profession. Now is our time to shine our light, symbolically using the light of Nightingale's lamp to propel us toward greater leadership in health care.
The strides we make in 2020 can be used as the launch pad for changing the image of nursing locally, nationally, and globally, to provide the public with an even more positive view of the most trusted profession. Now is our time to shine our light.