Scholarship Essay Entry – Kristine G.

My dream first took off between my summer of grade 11 and 12 when I decided to take on a care aid position at the local Extendicare. It was there that I discovered how much I loved helping people. It did not matter that I was simply helping them out of bed in the morning or helping them with the simplest task. If it put a smile on their face I was happy. During that time a certain nurse took notice of me and asked me to assist her with some things. One day when I was helping her she looked at me and said, "You should go into nursing, you would make a really great nurse some day."

There is a lot of suffering in this world at the present time. As a nurse I could help ease some of that suffering, even if only for a moment. Nurses play a huge role in comforting, not only patients but their family and friends as well. They are at the bedside night and day. They witness the miracles of birth and help with the transition people make to death. They witness people in their most vulnerable of states and the worst of their characters.

Through nursing I would like to bring a smile to my patients face, understanding through touch, and comfort with a warm blanket. I want to overcome the language barrier through acts of kindness and treating them as equals. Nursing is and will always be in demand and I do not want to limit my skills to one area and one community. I want to travel and touch the lives of many. To be taken out of my comfort zone and experience a completely different culture, to show others that I care enough to make the effort. By listening to the experiences other patients and nurses have gone through, I believe it will help shape me into a better person that can help more people as I go through my career.

I want to teach, be taught, care for, listen to and be there for the people that need it the most. I do not wish to reach a crowd of people at once. I want to reach out and make a difference one by one and have it carried on. The impact of truly helping one person would be a greater accomplishment for me than addressing an entire audience and possibly affecting a few of its members.

I am now entering my third year of university nursing and have had the privilege of hearing some stories. I have already met some amazing nurses in my community and hope that I can make even half of the difference some of them have made in so many lives. I greet each coming year with enthusiasm and a thirst for more knowledge on how to provide people with not only the best of care but with a patience for understanding their individual experiences.