College of the Redwoods – HEALTH OCCUPATIONS

Associate Degree, Nursing (ADN)

Registered Nursing Program

Philosophy

The faculty believe that individuals are holistic, multi-system beings encompassing mind-body-spirit. A person is viewed as whole and complete, regardless of illness or disease. Each person’s model of his or her own world is unique and influenced by a multiplicity of factors, including but not limited to: culture, spiritual connection, past experiences, genetics, environment and growth and development. In a health care system a client can be defined as an individual, a family or a community.

The faculty believe that health is a dynamic condition based upon a person’s ability to adapt and is not simply the absence of disease or infirmity. Each person’s perception of health along the health-illness continuum is unique and personally described, encompassing mind-body-spirit.

The faculty believe that nursing is a dynamic, interactive, transpersonal relationship between nurse and client which aids the individual to identify, mobilize, and develop his or her own strengths. Nurses seek to know and understand the client’s personal model of his or her own world and to appreciate its value and significance from the client’s perspective (Erickson, Tomlin, and Swain, 1983). Nursing is both an art and science, which integrates a special core of nursing knowledge with other disciplines, and uses a nursing process framework. We believe that a core principle in nursing is caring. Coming into the moment with a client with an authentic, caring and healing intent is paramount. We believe that nursing joins with the client on a mutual search for wholeness of being and becoming, in order to potentiate comfort measures, pain control, a sense of well being, wholeness, or even spiritual transcendence of suffering (Watson, 1996).

The faculty believe that the responsibility for learning is shared by both the student and teacher. Students, like clients, vary in experiences, values, cultural beliefs, needs, goals; learning styles and have different potentials for growth and levels of motivation. We are committed to sensitive, flexible, caring and creative education while maintaining high standards of competence and accountability. The teacher’s role is to guide student discovery; positively facilitate student’s capabilities; and motivate growth and critical thinking abilities. We strive to instill the value of learning as an ongoing, lifelong process, which provides the student with not only professional competency but also personal transformation.

This philosophy statement comes from a collaboration of nursing faculty with a basis from several sources including, but not limited to, College of the Redwood’s Philosophy and the Nursing theories of Modeling-Role-Modeling (Erickson, Tomlin and Swain, 1983) and Human Caring (Watson, 1999).