The role of Historically Black Colleges and Universities in the inclusion and education of Hispanic nursing students

ABNF Journal, The, May-June, 2004 by Laura McQueen, Lynn Zimmerman

The struggle to recruit, retain and graduate Hispanic students in nursing education and practice is complicated by many of the same barriers that African American students experienced when gaining entry into nursing practice. The care and dedication of minority nursing faculty at HBCUs and in predominately white schools of nursing is a crucial element to a young black woman's success as a registered nurse. This same care is needed in the emergence of Hispanic nurses into healthcare. Nursing simply needs to care about having minorities as registered nurses in our schools and in our hospitals. This practice of an ethic of care and responsibility to each other is founded in the work of Historically Black Colleges and Universities. This pedagogical practice was core to assisting young repressed black women entrance into nursing and is therefore the practice necessary to "raise up" the next group of repressed people in this country. Undeniably, historically black schools are role models for success in educating and integrating minorities into healthcare careers and to raising their nurses to become caring and cultural competent practitioners.

Nursing needs to return to its roots as a "caring" profession, and re-examine its mission and the mission of nursing education. The ethical practice of caring as central to the role of the nurse in health care and nursing education is a professional commitment to all clients regardless of their race, ethnicity, or background. Paradoxically, the practice of care in nursing has assumed the masculine traits of competing for a place on the team and exclusion of some has become a predominant theme in nursing schools. How often have we heard educators say; "I made the students turn in care plans until I was satisfied they were complete"? Issues of control, dominance, and repetitive learning skills become the central messages to the student. Pedagogical philosophies, of "I had to do it in nursing school, so now it is your turn" are examples of stringent controls that are still embedded in nursing education and add to our exclusionary practices. We have placed care in the background and competed against our own future nurses in doing so.

Nel Noddings (1995) in discussing a morally defensible mission for schools argues, "We should abandon uniform requirements for college entrance" and instead, examine how we care for others. If we are indeed caring nursing educators, she believes we will take on the responsibility to continuously work with students to meet their goals while doing our best thinking in response to issues that affect students. As faculty we need to be cognizant of the obstacles exclusion creates in terms of gaining Hispanic and minorities in nursing. There are consequences to admitting only the students with the highest test scores who appear to have the greatest potential for passing the NCLEX RN exam on their first attempt. One of the consequences may be the exclusion of culturally competent nursing care and this exclusion means that one is not cared for.