Nursing would not be nursing without the work and vision of Florence Nightingale. Unfortunately, with an increasingly crowded curriculum, most nursing students are only exposed to the work of Nightingale peripherally and not given the impetus or opportunity to read her seminal work in depth. As part of a sophomore-level nursing research class, students were required to read Nightingale's 76-page Notes on Nursing1 at their leisure prior to the end of the semester. Students were encouraged to take their time with the reading so that they could get a deeper understanding of Nightingale's work and perspective. Near the end of the semester, students were asked to respond to a discussion board asking them (1) in what ways does the work of Nightingale represent evidence-based nursing and (2) to consider what they found most interesting about this book. Students included a specific exemplar with page number. Feedback from the students indicated this was one of their favorite assignments, as they were able to understand the role Nightingale had in personalized evidence-based patient care. Students' comments included that they found some of her excerpts "funny" and "didn't realize what a cool person she was." Students shared they could understand how the work of Nightingale was relevant even in today's nursing environment (eg, with the pandemic) and, more importantly, how her work laid the foundation for modern evidence-based nursing.

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