Hello All - I am searching for an honest opinion!!
I am currently in the process of applying for a few nursing programs around the Kansas City area! I have a BA and an MBA (neither related to nursing).
Upon applying to these programs, I worry that my gpa for my BA (3.2) may hinder my ability to get in! My MBA gpa is 4.0. Anyway, im hoping to get an interview with the schools I apply for, just because I think I can explain my desire to become a nurse a lot easier in person than on paper! But I am a little worried about going in for an interview!
I am an African American female, and I'm really not sure if that could potentially be a disadvantage. Just want to hear opinions. I am asking because one school I looked up was the University of Kansas nursing program. I would love to attend this one as I have heard it was a great school, but even just looking at the photos online of their nursing program, I don't see much diversity at all. It can sometimes be a bit discouraging.
I really think finding a program that values diversity not only with race but gender, previous schooling background, work experience, etc. would be beneficial! Any ideas on this? Thoughts? Advice on schools?
As an African American female nurse, I'll say you have no reason to be concerned. It's true that the programs aren't very diverse; we are in the minority. It's not because schools are rejecting us because of race. It's just the definition of minority. I was the only African American in my graduating class, and I wasn't treated any differently from anyone else. Another thing we have in common, I also have a BS unrelated to nursing and a MBA.
Again, in reference to my earlier post, come tell my children that. Have a conversation with two girls with two entirely different races, raised in the same household who have wholly different experiences based only on race. It will continue to matter as long as racists still hold positions where they teach, police, or any other positions where they have community influence. This is a bleak truth we need to work against.
I have blue eyes, therefore I have a higher risk of developing glaucoma. That's not a form of discrimination, that is a physiological affect of having blue eyes.
Racism and discrimination are social concepts. People may say that they don't like fat people because fat people are unhealthy and cost more money to keep healthy, and while it's true that there are some higher risks with being overweight, it's still a social concept that says it's okay to discriminate against someone for being fat, because they are lazy and lack the willpower to lose the weight. Just like it's a social concept that says black men are thugs with no family support, or native Americans are drunks. These are all stereotypes used to justify treating someone differently, they're social. Of course we need to address physiological differences. If I have a darker skinned patient and I am this far north, I'm going to wonder about vitamin d levels. That's not discrimination, that is looking out for my patient.
The medical example was meant to be illustrative of how if we don't know where the problem lies before we start intervening then we can increase disparities. If we want to ameliorate disparities in education, for instance, we need to know where those disparities exist and what forces perpetuate them. You might think that putting more money into education would affect the number of low performing schools that cluster in neighborhoods where people of color reside, but if you did that through increased property taxes then you'd be benefiting higher performing schools, because they tend to already get more money from property taxes than low performing schools. Again, this is merely an example of why you need to first know where the problem is before intervening. You can apply this rationale to basically any issue of systemic discrimination.
I respect the desire to make things better for everyone. It's noble, but in order to do that we have to be judicious, because we have limited resources with which to approach the problem.
I think the first step is to understand the difference between discrimination and prejudice. We need to start at the source. Yes there are systemic sources of prejudice such as people of color not being given home loans, which led to racial ghettos, which again reinforced stereotypes. And this was recently, not about civil war and slavery issues. Wasn't it NC that was sued for sterilizing poor/black women without consent? Tuskegee happening at all is signs of prejudice.
We also need to recognize that these things happen and not be bystanders.
North Carolina did not single out poor black women to sterilize. At the time, pre-World War II through the early fifties, many states had eugenics programs where selective sterilization was employed. In NC, 39% of those sterilized in total were African American, so 61% were not. Later on in the 60s the focus shifted and African Americans were sterilized at a higher rate than other races. For most of the program's life, it was about women, with 85% of sterilized being female overall, and 99% female in the ending years. The last recorded sterilization under this program occurred in 1973.
What I took away is that the program started out as an ideal to reduce the number of mentally ill or infectious citizens, but turned into a program of political power benefitting white men before it was abolished.
Let's be sincere to ourselves. They claim it doesn't matter, but they do it secretly. I once applied to an Accelerated BSN, had an interview with them via Skype because I was in Africa; from my interview and according to few people I had in the background that were quiet and heard every conversation, said I was super great. Few days later I received the rejection later. That's is it, I applied again, and they rejected me without granting me an interview. Mind you, I didn't put my race in my first application (I think).
North Carolina did not single out poor black women to sterilize. At the time, pre-World War II through the early fifties, many states had eugenics programs where selective sterilization was employed. In NC, 39% of those sterilized in total were African American, so 61% were not. Later on in the 60s the focus shifted and African Americans were sterilized at a higher rate than other races. For most of the program's life, it was about women, with 85% of sterilized being female overall, and 99% female in the ending years. The last recorded sterilization under this program occurred in 1973.
What I took away is that the program started out as an ideal to reduce the number of mentally ill or infectious citizens, but turned into a program of political power benefitting white men before it was abolished.
You're right, before WW2 it mostly was used to target women who were considered "feebleminded" which covered anything from learning disabilities to having children out of wedlock. It was originally started because they thought they could get rid of developmental disabilities by not allowing people who they determined to be feebleminded to have children. Even that was not altruistic. It was often used on victims of rape and the poor.
THIS. This is the thing that gets me. When some non Person of color deems to admit to the history of slavery they can't even be bothered to do it without throwing in non blacks as though the situation is the same. I am going to be brutally honest for a moment and say that since you keep mentioning the jewish people and the holocaust jewish people aren't forced to live up the street from Auschwitz. Your grandchildren don't go to school with Mengele's grandchildren telling you to get over it its the past while they are wearing their Auschwitz will rise again T-shirts. You're not at the mercy of those same descendents for a job or seat in school. The other difference between AA people and white skinned "undesirables is that we never had the opportunity to get a nosejob and change our last name as many jews, italians, irish etc. did. Unless you were light enough to "pass for white" there was no hiding your ethnicity.
I will be brutally honest with your post.
The atrocities that Jews have suffered because of who they are/were spans centuries and countries.
Germany and the Holocaust are only one of the more recent calmatites.
I could write some testimonial about being Jewish but that doesn't add to the conversation at this point.
Suffice it to say, that for most Jews, being Jewish is a core identity and experience as powerful and meaningful as any ethnicity.
I have to say, your post talks about how you say that non-blacks don't get the impact of slavery on black people. I would point out that you don't get the Jewish experience.
I will clearly admit I don't know the black experience personally because I haven't lived it. I have learned somethings that I didn't know about and have begun to see things in a different light. I have learning to do as does all of us as a society.
I am shocked that you throw out the nose job or name change comment as justification.
That is on par with telling someone to bleach their skin or straighten their hair.
It can be construed just as racist and bigoted as to what you are crying foul about.
We all are on a learning curve and no one is 100% right nor 100% wrong.
The atrocities that Jews have suffered because of who they are/were spans centuries and countries.
Germany and the Holocaust are only one of the more recent calmatites.
I could write some testimonial about being Jewish but that doesn't add to the conversation at this point.
Suffice it to say, that for most Jews, being Jewish is a core identity and experience as powerful and meaningful as any ethnicity.
I have to say, your post talks about how you say that non-blacks don't get the impact of slavery on black people. I would point out that you don't get the Jewish experience.
I will clearly admit I don't know the black experience personally because I haven't lived it. I have learned somethings that I didn't know about and have begun to see things in a different light. I have learning to do as does all of us as a society.
I am shocked that you throw out the nose job or name change comment as justification.
That is on par with telling someone to bleach their skin or straighten their hair.
It can be construed just as racist and bigoted as to what you are crying foul about.
We all are on a learning curve and no one is 100% right nor 100% wrong.
What are you talking about ? I was never trying to diminish the experiences that the Jews had my only point is that the black experience in America is often diminished by never allowing it to stand on its own, like it always has to be compared to what someone else has gone through in the same breath. And as far as the bleaching of the skin and straightening of the hair I have no idea what you're talking about I only used it as an example of how white skinned people were able to hide their ethnicity and pass therefore having a better future for themselves and their children when that option was never available to black skinned people.
Let's be sincere to ourselves. They claim it doesn't matter, but they do it secretly. I once applied to an accelerated BSN, had an interview with them via Skype because I was in Africa; from my interview and according to few people I had in the background that were quiet and heard every conversation, said I was super great. Few days later I received the rejection later. That's is it, I applied again, and they rejected me without granting me an interview. Mind you, I didn't put my race in my first application (I think).
While I would never argue that racism no longer exists in the US, I think it's more complicated than this. These days, nursing is so popular that schools are getting anywhere from dozens to hundreds of applications for each seat. Lots of people are not getting into nursing school, regardless of their skin color or ethnic heritage, including many people who are "super great" in interview (I've been faculty in nursing schools, and involved in the selection process in more than one school). I'm sorry you didn't get into the school you wanted, but, without some evidence that the school is systematically excluding minority students, it's hard to consider a single anecdote evidence of "secret" racism.
jaycam, RN
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You don't watch the news do you?