Concepts of Florence Nightingale as a Global Model in Undergraduate Nursing

Undergraduate nursing education is perpetually faced with the challenge of helping young students to both understand and appreciate nursing from a foundational and historical perspective. Students reside in the immediate present, worrying about procedural check-offs, clinical expectations, and, ultimately, NCLEX. This discussion defines a variety of processes used to bring the global nature of nursing into the students' stream of consciousness utilizing concepts originally espoused by Florence Nightingale. 2010 is the 100th anniversary of the death of Florence Nightingale. This presents an opportunity to emphasize the contributions she made to nursing education, practice and global leadership. There are impediments to presenting this content including limited recognition of the continuing relevance of nursing history in general and Nightingalean content in, limited access to nurse historians who have specialized knowledge in the Nightingale literature and lack of familiarity with available information resources. Global health has been viewed as a route to global peace. Nightingale's perspective of nursing as a global construct and global constant focuses the importance of this profession in achieving international cooperation and development. Encouraging nursing students to think outside of their immediate situation prepares them to function in a global leadership role. A number of strategies such as web-based courses, study abroad offerings and podcasts broaden the accessibility of accurate resources such as The Nightingale Initiative for Global Health (NIGH) can act as a clearinghouse for both people and information. This presentation will detail content and strategies to maximize the potential of reaching significant numbers of students with viable information to carry them forward to the global stage.