The mission of the Stony Brook School of Nursing is to prepare nurse leaders at all entries of practice to advance the health of the people of New York, the wider geographic regions and the global community with a focus on the underserved. This is accomplished through innovative, high quality and accessible educational programs, clinical practice, research, and public service.
The essay needs to address the following topics:
Discuss the personal qualities and attributes that you think will be useful as well as those that you feel need further development in preparation for the nursing profession.
Provide your own definition of cultural competence, ethical sensitivity, leadership and life-long learning as well as how you may incorporate these concepts in your professional practice.
Discuss how a graduate education in nursing will impact your future career goals
Your essay should be no longer than 3 to 5 double-spaced pages.
Entrance Essay
I possess unique qualities and attributes that make me fit effectively in the nursing profession and in the leadership position within my specialty. While these attributes and qualities are sources of my strength, I feel that there are some of them that still need improvement. The respect and dignity that I have towards others enable me to seek to understand the needs of patients and their families. I also use these values to learn my patient’s capabilities and areas that I need to prioritize when developing care plans. Caring, as a nursing quality, enables me to provide care with a difference to patients. My caring quality has manifested itself severally since I joined the profession as it has always guided me to implement interventions that relieve patients from suffering. With the caring quality, I am able to provide care that generates positive impacts on patients. Nurses need effective communication skills to be able to form strong therapeutic relationships with their patients and to be able to share opinions with other healthcare providers. I consider my strong communication skills to be very useful as I prepare to become a nurse leader. I often utilize my communication skills to convey and interpret information correctly for the provision of safe and quality patient care. Other qualities and attributes that I possess and that I find useful for the profession include empathy, paying attention to detail, problem-solving, and critical thinking abilities.
However, there are some areas that I feel need further development as I prepared to become a nurse leader. One of these areas is my level of commitment to patient advocacy. As a core foundation of healthcare, patient advocacy should be practiced by every nurse and it is the degree of the nurse’s commitment to the process that will determine the creation of policies that support the provision of the best care for patients. As the nursing field continues to grow and expand, its future success will depend on the availability of effective leaders who can utilize the systems approach to sufficiently lead their organizations towards realizing their mission and vision. I need to learn leadership skills that can help me to steer contemporary organizations and create systems that work effectively to improve the quality of healthcare and shape the image of the nursing profession. I believe that pursuing a graduate program at the Stony Brook School of Nursing will improve my patient advocacy and leadership skills.
Nurses are able to incorporate various concepts effectively into their professional practice when they adequately understand their meaning and impacts on the nursing profession. Some of the key concepts that I feel are appropriate for my profession include cultural competence, ethical sensitivity, leadership, and lifelong learning. My definition of cultural competence is the ability to develop meaningful relationships, understand, respect, and interact effectively with people from different cultural backgrounds. I may incorporate cultural competence in professional practice by demonstrating inclusivity when working with patients, families, and colleagues from diverse cultural backgrounds. I may also demonstrate cultural competence by avoiding all forms of discrimination while at the same time allowing patients and colleagues chances to express their views and concerns irrespective of their cultural backgrounds. I define ethical sensitivity as an attribute that entails paying attention to ethical values and understanding one’s responsibility to engage in moral acts, especially when faced with a dilemma. I may incorporate ethical sensitivity in professional practice to assess conflict-laden situations with the aim of identifying ethical challenges and making decisions that will generate moral outcomes for all the parties involved.
As a graduate-prepared nurse, I engage in lifelong learning and strive to achieve skills that will enable me to assume leadership positions in the field of nursing in the future. I define leadership as the process of directing and influencing people to achieve a common goal. As a graduate-level nurse, I am expected to possess leadership skills and knowledge for steering healthcare teams and settings to enable them to achieve their missions and visions. I may incorporate leadership in my professional practice by forming strong and meaningful relationships with the health care team and influencing them to work towards achieving clearly identified goals and objectives. My definition of lifelong learning is the process of obtaining education for personal growth and development. These educational programs include both formal and informal learning and may occur either outside or inside formal educational settings. I may incorporate lifelong learning in professional practice by persistently enrolling in educational programs, both outside and inside formal educational institutions, for personal growth and fulfillment.
I believe that graduate education in nursing will positively impact my future career goals in numerous ways. Completing the program will present numerous career options which will place me in the right position in the job market. In addition to attracting high pay rates, graduate education in nursing will enable me to obtain an advanced level of knowledge that I can apply in practice to improve clinical practice and the nursing profession. Given an opportunity to complete a graduate program in nursing at the Stony Brook School of Nursing, I promise to do my best to improve my knowledge and skill gaps to be able to improve my professional practice and rise to a higher position in the job market.