Evening Republican, Volume 21, Number 164, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 July 1918 — THE CALL FOR STUDENT NURSES [ARTICLE]

THE CALL FOR STUDENT NURSES

Jasper County has been asked to save food, to give time, and money and service and men. We have fulfilled every obligation. Now we are asked to furnish 20 student nurses. Can we. do it? Have we twenty young women between the ages of 19 and 35, who are physically fit, who lave had a high school education or its equivalent, who are ready to enroll themselves as a student reserve ’or training in either army or civilian lospitals? Our graduate nurses are needed abroad in great numbers and we must lave more nurses ready here for the sick at hoipe, for the wounded who will be sent back, and for the tremendous work of reconstruction which will continue after the war is over.

The student need not pledge herself for services overseas, but her work here releases some other nurses for foreign duty, while she remains on the equally important service at lome. Practically all training schools furnish uniforms, text books, board and lodging. The girl will need money only for street clothing, amusements and incidentals. Here is an opportunity for young women to enter a splendid profession and render their country invaluable service .while so doing. Miss Best, superintendent of a nurses’ training school in Chicago, spoke at the library Sunday afternoon to a deeply interested body of women and girls. She sketched very briefly a history of the nursing profession which has had in its ranks many noble women and which demands and develops all of a woman’s finest qualities. She described the life of a student nurse during her three years-of training, the effort made to surround the girls with helpful influences and the - many opportunities given fop pleasant diversions. Miss Best emphasized the fact that the student is of service as soon as her training’begins—that her supervised work releases older nurses for other tasks. She pointed out the many different lines of work now possible to the trained nurse—private duty, institutional work, community, industrial or army nursing. The salaries are equal to those offered by any occupation open to women and the social standing of a nurse depends solely on the girl herself. Miss Best's good talk and her cheerful readiness in answering the mfcny questions of her listeners were greatly appreciated.