On February 20th, 2020, a group of students from the Westinghouse College Prep visited the UIC Colleg of Nursing. They were offered with valuable information about the variety of healthcare programs available at UIC, as well as the different programs offered at the College of Nursing.
The visit began with Charese Jackson welcoming the students and introducing Dr. Phoenix Matthews, Associate Dean for Equity and Inclusion. The latter presented students with the prevalence of cigrette smoking in the African American Communities. They also spoke about the importance of research studies and a career in research to bring the information back to the community and further to improve its health outcome. Furthermore, students received an introduction to nursing, the role of nursing, and the variety of nursing careers. The presentation was followed by a visit to the newly renovated simulation lab for clinical skills. Students participated in lab with demonstrations on some basic nursing skills. At one station, they interacted with a fake infant , listened to normal infant heart and lung sounds then compared to the sounds when the infant is in distress. Then they moved on for stoma care and nasopharyngeal tube insertion, followed by the station at where they were able to listen to the heart and lung sounds of a child. The last station was wound care, where students learned how to take care of a wound.
Later on, students had lunch and enjoyed a converstion with a panel of current nursing students who shared about their reasoning for choosing nursing as their career.