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VCU School of Nursing will mark its 125th anniversary this year with a variety of activities to celebrate its tradition of being a leader in nursing education and research. Founded in 1893 as the Virginia Hospital Training School for Nurses, the school has evolved from initially offering a diploma in nursing to currently offering bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral degree programs. VCU School of Nursing has graduated more than 11,000 nurses and currently enrolls approximately 800 students annually.

Equipping up-and-coming student leaders with the necessary skills for success will strengthen their impact on the nursing profession and the health care community. Even more important, it will help identify and fill a need for next-generation leaders, a result of the increasing complexity of health care delivery combined with the current and impending wave of retirements among baby-boomer leaders in nursing. In direct response to this need, VCU School of Nursing has created and launched a new Leadership Fellows Program. The program actively encourages and supports the development of future leaders in nursing and provides selected outstanding undergraduate students with full in-state tuition for two years.

VCU School of Nursing recently marked an important milestone during its 125th year - the graduation of its first cohort of the Doctor of Nursing Practice program. VCU is the first university in the state to offer a DNP degree that is focused mainly on quality and safety in health care. The program serves as an alternative to the school’s existing research-focused doctoral degree. It prepares nurses to translate research into evidence-based practice and to lead teams of health care professionals toward improving patient outcomes.

VCU School of Nursing is once again ranked in the top 50 of the nation's graduate schools of nursing, moving up seven spots according to this week's announcement by U.S. News and World Report. VCU School of Nursing is ranked at No. 41 overall. In addition, VCU's Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) program made the top 50 for the first time since it was launched three years ago, ranking No. 48.

When women are diagnosed with breast cancer, their treatment is usually based on characteristics of the general population of women fighting this disease. “They’re making life-changing decisions based on probabilities, and those probabilities are based on population predictors,” said Theresa Swift-Scanlan, Ph.D., RN, associate professor at the School of Nursing. Swift-Scanlan intends to change that. “I want to explore how those decisions could be based on their individual risk factors; the context of their environment,” she said.

Angie Smith, AGACNP-BC (B.S.‘13/N; M.S.‘15/N), made frequent visits to the hospital as a little girl because her mother was very ill. At a young age she realized she wanted to be a nurse. Smith told her Mom, “I will take care of you.” Originally from New York, Smith moved to Puerto Rico with her family when she was three years old. Later she joined the military, which led her to move to Virginia. Her time in the Marine Corps taking care of injured Marines inspired Smith to seek a degree in biomedical engineering from VCU. Back then she wanted to help improve prosthetics for injured veterans. But her goals soon changed. “I realized that instead of working in a lab, I wanted to be with patients and provide compassionate medical care,” said Smith, a Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) student at the VCU School of Nursing.