Nursing Success tutoring program gives students a leg up
Child care and pizza offered too

HCC nursing student Faith DeChristopher walked up to the patient, asked a few questions and began the intake assessment.

“Let's see, her skin color is good, there's no skin lacerations, no swelling, no drooping (of the eyelids),” she said aloud. “But what happens if her pupils are uneven?”

DeChristopher (shown standing in the photo) was actually performing a mock assessment of HCC Nursing Success coordinator Kelly Keane (seated), all the while getting extra help from nursing academic counselor Michelle Moeller.

Each week, first semester nursing students like DeChristopher can participate in an after-hours extra help session that offers tutoring and prep work and on some nights pizza and child care for students who could not attend otherwise.

For many students, the introduction to nursing is fast and furious. The weekly curriculum includes six hours of lab work, twelve hours of clinical training and four hours of class time.

“At nursing success, students are coached and they can feel free to ask as many questions as they need,” Cyndy Marshall, nursing lab coordinator, said. “For many of our nursing students this is all very new and they can get overwhelmed. We don't want that to happen.”

DeChristopher said “overwhelmed” was the best way to describe the influx of information she's learned since the start of the school year. Having left a job in retail, she is new to many aspects of nursing.

“When you sit down before an exam to study, there is so much material. Here, they tell you what to focus on and it brings everything into perspective,” DeChristopher, of West Springfield, said.

For students like Sheila Rice, of Easthampton, and Nadezhda Paliy, of Chicopee, who have had some prior experience in health care, understanding medical terminology and adapting to the environment may be a little easier, but that doesn't mean the extra help isn't needed or appreciated.

“It got to the point where I wanted to do more, to learn more,” said Rice, who previously worked as a home health aide for the elderly.

Paliy said she had graduated from a medical assistant training program at another college where little extra help was offered. At HCC, the study groups and nursing success program has made a big difference. “Here, I practice after a lesson and I get even better,” Paliy said.

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