With the demand for health care workers continuing to rise, Joy Simms looked toward Nursing as a rewarding career that would provide a secure job future in her North Island community.
Today, as a Full-time Registered Nurse at the Port McNeill hospital, Joy admits she had some reservations about going back to school when she started five years ago.
“I was terrified - high school graduation was a distant memory” Joy recalls. “Of course, my first thought was ‘how could we afford my education as a single income family with six kids?’ Plus, two of our children were preschoolers at the time. I think that many probably thought I was completely out of my mind, or that I would never finish. But my husband was 100% behind me. So I thought, do it or don’t. I wasn’t getting any younger,” she laughed.
Joy heard about NIC’s Nursing program from a student and single mom who had moved from the North Island to attend the nursing program in Courtenay. “After her first year, she was so positive about the program that it really inspired me to go.”
Soon after, Joy found direction at NIC’s Port Hardy Campus, where she began upgrading to meet the Nursing program requirements. Looking back, she attributes much of her success to the staff and faculty there who helped her get started.
“If an NIC centre hadn’t been in my community right off the bat, I doubt that I would have gone on,” she declared. “That initial contact with the college is what inspires you to go farther. My instructor Debby Howard was just amazing, and the advisors were really, really supportive. When I would doubt myself, they really helped me through.”
With the support of her family and her goal in sight, Joy set off to start her first semester of NIC’s Nursing program in September 2002. She lived in the family’s travel trailer at a campground while studying in Courtenay, and returned home on weekends. During the week, Joy’s husband who also worked long days took care of their children.
“After the first year I was really exhausted,” Joy admits. “I remember my husband calling me partway through 2nd semester. He told me he had quit his job of 18 years because it was more important for all of us to be together, which it was. So we packed up and moved to Cumberland, and everybody thrived once we made the move.”
Three years later in June 2006, Joy received her Baccalaureate of Science in Nursing degree, and the Simms family returned to the Mount Waddington area, where Joy was hired almost immediately as a full-time Registered Nurse at the Port McNeill Hospital.
“I absolutely love being a nurse, and NIC made it possible for me to do this at all. Honestly, if the Nursing program was not available in Courtenay, I probably would not have chosen to be a nurse, because I never would have imagined myself going farther away. I didn’t want to raise my kids in a city. And really, why I would go anywhere else and pay more money and be farther away?”
As the first member of her extended family to complete a post-secondary degree, Joy says the program has given her more confidence. And, with her oldest child currently studying in Victoria to be a Licensed Practical Nurse, and her second already graduated from Selkirk in Nelson, Joy feels it has inspired her kids to look beyond high school too.
“If you have a goal and you really want to do it, you will make it work no matter what,” explains Joy.
“It’s not easy and it takes sacrifices from your family, there’s some self sacrifice but it’s so worth it in the end. I have no regrets, no regrets at all. My kids call me a geek but they’re proud of me.”
North Island College is proud to announce that it’s first local class of Practical Nurses will graduate from Port Hardy campus on June 13, 2007. Graduates of this program are eligible to become Licenced Practical Nurses (LPNs), and receive a full year’s credit toward NIC’s Nursing degree program in the Comox Valley.
For information on NIC’s Nursing Degree Program visit www.nic.bc.ca or contact the campus.
Pictures: Joy Simms, Nursing Grad, Joy's supportive family
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For further information contact:
Susan Toresdahl
Director College Relations
(250) 334-5271
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