Nursing Education Concept By Adeline Nyamathi
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Who is Adeline Nyamathi,As a Nursing Educator ,Journey to Education ,Interest in Teaching,Preparation For Task,Training For Teaching,Evolution as An Educator,Research as an Educator,Subject of Interest,Sense of Comfort Feeling As a Teacher,Teaching As a Challenge,Embarrassing Teaching Moments,Rewarding Side of Teaching,Less Rewarding Aspects of Teaching,Gaining Excellence as A Teacher,Advice For New Educators.
Who is Adeline Nyamathi
Adeline Nyamathi is
Professor and Associate Dean for Academic Affairs at the University of
California, Los Angeles School of Nursing.
She earned the BSN at Hunter College
Bellevue School of Nursing, MSN at State University of New York at Stony Brook,
and PhD from Case Western Reserve University. She is a Fellow in the American
Academy of Nursing and has received numerous teaching awards over the course of
her career.
As a Nursing Educator
Dr Nyamathi is
responsible for organizing and implementing educational programs locally and
internationally. Her funded research has been directed at assessing the
effectiveness of health education and resource programs among homeless and
impoverished populations.
She is presently conducting an investigation in one of
the largest Indian System of Medicine programs in Delhi, where there is an
integration of HIV education and prevention. She is widely published on works
related to HIV/AIDS.
Journey to Education
Dr Nyamathi
believes that teaching, research, and administration is a wonderful and very
fulfilling academic role combination.
Along with her administrative
responsibilities, she teaches courses in the doctoral program on the state of
the science in family and community research, and maintains a continuous engagement
in funded research projects.
Although she did not participate in a formal
mentoring program, she learned a lot from her teachers. She guides new faculty
to seek the resources that they will need to help them become the best that
they can be.
Interest in Teaching
She first became
interested in teaching after she had completed her master’s program and was in
the doctoral program. The idea of working in an academic setting and doing
research was very appealing to me.
Preparation For Task
She went through
the Francis Payne Bolton School of Nursing Program at Case Western Reserve
University. We did not have any formal classes on how to teach and this is why
it was very important for me to offer education courses to our doctoral
students.
We offer a special course where students are enrolled in a four-unit
course and spend 10-12 hours a week with a faculty member who is engaged in
teaching.
They help the faculty member develop the course objectives and the
exams for the class, including evaluating the psychometric properties of the
exams. The students also provide lectures in the class as well as sit in and
observe the expertise of the faculty member.
Training For Teaching
They did not have
mentors in the doctoral program she attended; however, at the UCLA School of
Nursing, she learned from the people who inspired me. These are teachers who
have impressed me greatly in terms of their ability to engage students, while
being humble.
They were able to provide a wealth of information and inspire
students to become wonderful in their own right, and to achieve the goals they
had envisioned for themselves. It is these people whom you emulate and strive
to model in your teaching.
Evolution as An Educator
Her expertise has
evolved over time in that she was becoming less rigid. She has always been good
at listening to students and learning from them. Over time, you become more
expert in your area of research and the theoretical constructs that you teach.
It almost becomes second nature, so that you could do it in your sleep. When
one becomes so engaged in research, then the actual practice of what you do
makes the teaching much more natural and fuller of examples and illustrations
that really provide depth and quality to the experience of teaching
Research as an Educator
Her research is
situated in Los Angeles and in India. In Los Angeles, she has been an NIH
funded researcher for 17 years, and has focused on improving the health and
well-being of homeless populations.
What we have done in 17 years is to provide
intervention programs, where we enroll homeless adults in an intervention or a
usual care program. They educate them about HIV risk reduction and health
promotion activities, and evaluate the impact of the intervention when it is 6
months, 1 year, or 2 years out.
They have engaged a wonderful group of nurses
who are very much a part of the community where we work. The community is
called Skid Row. It is where the homeless pitch their tents and cardboard box
condos. It is where they live on the streets and where they function.
Our staff
is situated there and she go out and have meetings with them taking part in the
research side by side with them as often as she can. The clients/participants
involved in our program have known the staff for many years and are always
interested in knowing what will be our next grant.
They help us in terms of
being a reality check as far as where we are going next. They have expanded our
HIV prevention focus to include TB and hepatitis prevention. Currently, theyenroll
homeless adults who are TB positive into a TB prevention program.
These people
have all been exposed to TB, are not active yet, but are much more likely to
become active TB patients because they have poor immune systems, improper
diets, are into drugs and alcohol, and live in very close quarters.
All the
factors place them at high risk for acquiring active TB. In this study homeless
adults are enrolled in a special nurse case managed program or usual care, and
are paid a nominal amount of money to receive twice weekly INH medication for
52 weeks.
We had 72% in this special nurse case managed program complete TB
chemo-prophylaxis, compared to 46% in the control group. They both were paid
the same amount of money, so it was not the money. It was engaging with nurses
who really cared for them and encouraged them to come to the program.
Subject of Interest
The courses she teaches
in the doctoral program relate to the state of the science in terms of family
and community research. They very much focus on what she does in my day-to-day
activity with research.
They talk about ways to engage the community and become
culturally competent. she teach three doctoral classes and am the Associate
Dean, thus part of my time is spent in administration teaching, research, and
administration are a wonderful combination.
She interacts with the faculty in
revising the curriculum, keeping the curriculum up to date, and minimizing
redundancies throughout the program. She brings culturally competent
experiences to the faculty and to the program.
For example, just today she
interviewed someone who is interested in offering a Spanish immersion class in
Mexico. She am part of the Dean’s advisory committee, so we discuss budget and
many related issues.
Sense of Comfort Feeling As a Teacher
She has been
teaching since 1984, and would say after about 5 or 6 years that she fell into
a niche about what she really love to talk about and teach.
Teaching As a
The challenges that
she face relate to being competent in fulfilling the many activities faculty
have to do at the same time. Not only are they expected to be expert teachers,
but also to be prosperous with a program of research.
Faculty have to write
grants, and write manuscripts. The challenge becomes how to juggle all these
activities at the same time while grading papers and being available for
students any time of the night or day.
Embarrassing Teaching Moments
One time she was
teaching about the cardiovascular system and was talking about ejection
fraction and used the term ejaculation by mistake. Her husband who is a cardiac
surgeon always reminds her of that one.
Rewarding Side of Teaching
The most rewarding
outcomes of teaching are seeing students grow. To engage them when they are so
unsure of themselves and lacking in self-esteem, then to watch them progress,
and see how well they do with a little bit of advice and recommendation is
marvelous.
Watching how students just take off is the most rewarding experience
for the faculty. We have also been able to get the students involved in our
research and use this involvement as a teaching opportunity.
Less Rewarding Aspects of Teaching
She has not
experienced any unrewarding aspects. However, she is sure that there are
faculty who do experience times that are not rewarding.
One situation that she knows
of is about a very brave faculty member who is really pushing hard to get the
students to have excellent writing skills. The students come in with diverse
writing skills and for her to push the students to rewrite their papers is a
challenge.
Students can become hostiles about these kinds of things. It is
frustrating for me to hear how the students really blasted her in her evaluation.
However, several students reported that the course had made them become better
writers.
Gaining Excellence as A Teacher
She maintains
excellence by continuing to do all the activities that she does. By this 1 mean
continuing to engage in research, getting the experiential background to
constantly be involved in teaching, and always striving to be an excellent
teacher. She am still growing and continuing to learn from people that she
admire as teachers.
Advice For New Educators
First of all,
faculty have to be aware of all the available resources in the school and on
the campus. For example, there is instructional support. for faculty where they
can learn how to do PowerPoint and how to deal with large classes, hostile
students, and disruptive students.
They have a mentored approach with young
faculty when they first join the faculty. They are paired with a more senior
and experienced faculty member. The new faculty member can sit in on classes of
the more experienced faculty member, ask questions, and be guided in terms of
teaching.
More importantly, they are guided in terms of moving along the tenure
process. because that is where the faculty oftentimes get hung up or do not
progress very well. This mentorship really functions on all levels in teaching
and also research.
They also have an Associate Dean for Research who helps
faculty in terms of reviewing their grants and making sure their grants are
ready to be submitted to NIH.
They have modeling parties where faculty function
similarly to an NIH review study session, giving sound advice to the faculty
member before the grant goes out.
Because she is an endowed chair, along with
two other faculties, we are going to be offering this Faculty Research Oriented
Groups (FROG), where we engage the faculty who are writing manuscripts.
There
are all different kinds of resources that faculty need to seek. Thus, my advice
is to go out and seek the resources that they need to help them become the best
they can be.