Times they are a changin’
A couple of weeks
ago I made a pitch for some funds to supply each first year nursing student
with a netbook in order to survive in the Problem Based Learning course and to
have access to current knowledge for all their other nursing courses. You were generous with your donations in
2011, when almost none of the students had any devices that allowed them
to connect to the internet. And while
many of them had cell phones [which almost always had no money on them to make
calls], they were not the kind that allowed them to surf the net.
Only one year
later, almost all of the 2012 first year students have some sort of device that
allows them to get access to the net… most are smart phones. Apparently the word got out that if they were
to succeed in nursing at Mercy they would need to have something that allowed
for net access.
As with many
changes, many things are true. I think Tony and I can take some credit for
equipping the 2011 students with notebooks and helping them to see the benefits
of web-based research. Of course, we
were just the instruments of the generosity of our benefactors; otherwise we
would have just given them black and white pictures of a netbook and told them
to pretend…
If you ever needed
any evidence that the world is changing, here it is. A decade ago when I first went to Mercy, most
of the students could not afford to buy individual paper note books. [You know,
the ones with pages and lines.] Now,
Guyana is still one of the poorest countries in the Caribbean -- and most nursing
students have smart phones. They
are older models and older technologies that get dumped from the north to make
room for the fancier new ones.
Before I tell you
that I am canceling my efforts to provide everyone with a netbook, I want to
see if it is actually true that almost everyone has access to the net AND if
the technology that they have can best help them succeed in nursing and in the
future.
I think it is safe
to say that students will still need keyboards to type papers and reports. And the
details of anatomy and physiology illustrations require more viewing space than
a small phone provides. (This is from
my old perspective: I can’t see reading
any article for very long on such a small space. I still have to work at forcing myself to
read a long article without printing it off on paper!)
I do not go to
Guyana to help the students “get by”. I
go in the hope that they can thrive. And
if it is not sacrilegious to compare my nursing students to any soccer team I
have coached, I do not “put them on the pitch to lose”. I want them to think that they are as bright
and well-prepared as any nursing students in the world.
Now don’t get me
wrong,: many of my soccer teams
lost – and sometimes by large margins , but
if one of my players ever felt before the game that they were going to lose, I asked them to just leave; we’d do without
them. I know, and they know, that
they live in a poor but developing country.
However, I am not a poorly trained third world teacher and they will not
be inadequately trained third world students and nurses.
We will do our best
with the best available and the “game” will determine the winners.
Bob Dylan “The Times They Are A-Changin'”
Come
writers and critics
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.
Who prophesize with your pen
And keep your eyes wide
The chance won't come again
And don't speak too soon
For the wheel's still in spin
And there's no tellin' who
That it's namin'
For the loser now
Will be later to win
For the times they are a-changin'.
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