0:00
Hello everyone. I am Carolina Echeverria. I
0:06
work for the school of nursing and health professions and I've had the pleasure to supporting the Sigma Beta
0:12
Gamma Chapter at USF. We do have representatives from this chapter
0:18
today and also we want to thank them for hosting and allowing four of our
0:25
students to attend the Sigma Congress this year. they will be presenting their
0:30
work. And I also want to thank the school the San Jose Unified School
0:35
District. They opened their doors and supported our BSN students to complete
0:41
their work. So with that said, I want to make sure that our students get a
0:47
chance to introduce themselves. So Christina, would you mind introducing yourself and then we'll go around.
0:53
Absolutely. My name is Christina Lipps. I graduated from USF December of
0:59
2024, so just this last December. In this last year, I've had my DNP
1:04
project into completion. I live in Fresno, but I've gone to school at
1:10
USF for both my masters and my doctorate program. Oh, nice. Very nice.
1:15
Thank you, Christina. Beatrice, do you want to follow? Yes. Hello. My name is Beatrice.
1:23
I'm currently a BSN undergrad student at the University of San Francisco. I'm currently in my fourth year, so I'll be
1:29
graduating in May 2026. When my colleague Kennedy and I, we did this
1:35
presentation, it was during our junior year one semester. So, it was about a year
1:41
ago. Um, but yeah, we're so excited that we were able to be part of this and thank you for this opportunity. Nice.
1:48
Thank you, Vrice Kennedy. Oops. You're on mute.
1:56
Is she on mute or Yes, Pat. She She'll unmute herself. Thank you.
2:08
So, while Kennedy unmutes, Laura, do you want to introduce yourself?
2:13
Hi, my name is Laura. I am alumni from the USF uh family nurse practitioner
2:18
doctor program. I'm also working as a the nurse and then currently looking for
2:26
a job as a nurse practitioner. I was able to participate in this
2:32
wonderful conference by doing my project and yep right here.
2:39
Great. Okay. Thank you Laura. Are you able to unmute Kennedy? Yeah, I think she said it's loading but
2:46
I don't know if it is still right now. Okay. So, whenever you're ready, we'll
2:51
give you a chance to introduce yourselves. Thank you. Thank you all the students and the Sigma
2:58
representatives to be here. I think this is an a great opportunity to learn from them. So, I will pass it on to the
3:06
students and they will be presenting a slideshow. Thank you.
3:30
All right. So, this is a presentation that we all chipped in together.
3:35
It was a wonderful experience and we're going to talk all about it. But just to give us a little context of date
3:41
and time, this was in Seattle. It was during July 17th through the 20th and
3:47
it really just is bridging our Sigma Theta tow with our University of San Francisco.
3:53
Christina, we can see the screen that says present. So if you can click present so that way we can
3:59
Oh, I'm sorry. There we go. That's perfect. Thank you.
4:04
You have to share the screen that is on full screen. Let me stop sharing. Hold on. Because
4:14
Also, I would love those pictures so we can post it on LinkedIn. So, I'm going to put my email in the chat if you can
4:19
send them all to me from your presentation in Seattle. Sure. We're going to have their
4:24
presentation and we will have the opportunity to have it on our uh circle too.
4:30
Yeah, I want pictures there when they were presenting, not just a PowerPoint.
4:36
Absolutely. Thank you. You want to try again, Christina? Yes. I'm actually going to download it
4:42
because from the present view I was having trouble to select that screen. So, let me just download it because
4:47
maybe that might be easier. Okay. And I see Kennedy, you're back. Do you want to introduce yourself?
5:01
So, Kennedy is having issues with her audio, but she's also a BSN student
5:06
and she worked with Vietric on the project. Yay.
5:11
There she is. Can you guys hear me now? Yes. Perfect. Thank you. Perfect. It was loading. I'm so sorry.
5:18
But I'm Kennedy Ventura. I'm currently a senior one nursing student, part of the BSN program at USF. And as Beatress
5:24
mentioned, her and I were able to work our junior one semester to go ahead and start on this project and to see how far
5:30
it's come. I'm so excited to be able to be here and share it with you guys. Great. Thank you.
5:36
Wonderful. And while Christina is downloading and getting ready, I do see that we have some students that are
5:42
supporting Vatrice Kennedy and Laura and and Christina. Do consider applying
5:48
in the future. So, I'm glad that you're here to learn from them. And Christina, that looks awesome. We're good to go. Go
5:55
ahead. Okay. Got it to work. Okay. So, this was the congress event. I know we've
6:02
already done our intros, but this was us collectively as a group together on our first day. So yeah, let's move on.
6:09
When we first came together, we did this the open plenary session and it
6:15
was great for us to like really mingle a little bit, but we were also eating our lunch and it was a great time. They we
6:22
did like a little dance session and it was really just overwhelmingly inspiring, right? We were talking about
6:28
the impact that we can do as nurses and some of the roles that have been
6:34
carved from the people that are in this room, right? It was a wonderful wonderful time to really think about,
6:40
you know, what are our goals? What do we want to do with our lives? What's passion? What what is success and what
6:47
drives us to it, right? And so this was a great great introductory session to just kind of collectively be together,
6:54
see how ginormous we were in one ginormous room. But also like the
6:59
backing we have, right? So, we're all individual people, but together we are just a huge group that does a lot of
7:05
good around the world. And that was such an inspiring moment to actually like realize and see that.
7:12
Do you guys want to add anything else to that? Oh, yeah. So, I think I was the I think
7:19
Kennedy and Beatrice and me were arrived early. Uh but I think Canadian Beatatric
7:26
was having a hard time arriving to the a conference but when I arrived my
7:33
Google watch was keep saying oh body response warning I don't know if you're excited or stressed but it is showing
7:40
your heart rate is elevated and it was for sure it was both but it did really
7:46
opened up such a I never knew Sigma was this big and I never knew it was this a
7:54
big deal. And when I first arrived, there was so many nurses and so many
8:01
studies that it show how many nurses are passionate about research and how many
8:07
nurses are really serious about the quantitative research that nurses are
8:13
producing. And the questions that they ask is not something like simple
8:20
question like oh what was your project about? It was not it was just not that question but it was more of hey so I see
8:28
your project is about this can you tell me more about what you want us to help
8:33
or is there anything that we can like help you out so there was more of like a
8:40
comradit and team building moment where these nurses really wanted the youngsters to really know what they're
8:48
doing and really prep them and it just it's such an eye openener opening and it
8:53
was so motivating. Absolutely. I couldn't agree more.
8:59
I kind of want to bounce off of their ideas, but this is Beaches and I's first conference and so getting there,
9:07
finding out where to go, where to stay. Everything was an first time experience for us. But I just want to give a huge
9:14
thank you to Laura and Christina for bringing us in. And although we go to the same school, I have never seen them
9:20
at probably at Evening of Evidence, but they were so welcoming to us. And it felt so nice having those people just
9:27
make sure that we were okay, even though it wasn't their job or responsibility at all. But Laura was like, "Hey, we're
9:33
going to meet here." Or, "Hey, let's take the train back to the airport." And it was so helpful and kind of them to
9:38
just take us in and be one group to show what USF is all about.
9:48
I just wanted to add that on add on to that as well. I think compared to some of the other schools there were like
9:54
especially the global schools they were coming in a big group. So even though we weren't a big group it was nice that the
9:59
four of us we kind of held our ground together and then we traveled together too once we were able to meet up. So, I
10:05
think once we were able to meet up all together, it was really nice to be able to talk to one another despite like me
10:12
and Kennedy, it was our first time meeting Christina and Laura in person that morning. But I think it was really
10:17
nice. It was a really great experience that we were able to help each other out through this weekend or that weekend.
10:27
So, I wanted to just throw in this this little slide about uh how busy it was,
10:32
right? So I think this was something that I underestimated like I was expecting to go to like a research
10:38
conference, present my stuff and like you know but this was jam-packed. It was
10:45
every time we attended a session it was trying to drink from a fire hose. There was so much to learn and I feel like I
10:52
was just scraping the top and there was just there everything that I learned wanted me to learn more about it. Like I
10:58
just was it wasn't enough, right? It was like the more you know, the more you know you don't know. And so it was it
11:04
was great, but every single moment there was something planned. And so it was kind of like, okay, so while I'm in
11:10
this, what am I going to do next? Okay. Okay, it's going to be the next con concurrent session. So I need to
11:16
figure out of these 50 topics, which ones are we going to go to? Right. And it was a great experience. I feel like
11:23
if I had this beforehand, I would have maybe had like a a set almost like a
11:28
a tour guide of like, okay, I'm going to do this first and I'm going to do that next. And you know what? I looked up this article and I have 50 questions
11:34
about that one. And you know, I feel like there was so much to do and and this just kind of is like a little
11:40
snapshot of like like this is just the times. This is not even looking into like, oh, what does concurrent session D
11:46
have, right? So, I kept on referring back to these pages right here in in our
11:51
little handbook because this really helped guide where I was going to go next and what to expect. Is it going to
11:59
be a downtime? Is this a mingle network time or is this like a full force? Let's go to our next session and you know,
12:06
buckle down, get ready to learn, right? And so, yeah, this is I just tossed this in last minute as like a little guide of
12:12
like we were busy every single minute and it was great. We were so eager, right? Oh, sorry,
12:18
Kennedy. Go for it. I do also want to mention that we actually had apps on our phone with the
12:24
same schedule, which was really interesting to include technology as well as some people may not like looking
12:30
through the book that the book they gave us. So, having it on our phone, we were able to see, okay, this is where this
12:35
room is at. So, having two different sources for us was extremely helpful.
12:40
It's great. It was It was full. So me and Kennedy,
12:46
Beatatric and Christina, what we happened was, "Oh, okay. Let's meet at here." But then all four of us were
12:54
like, "Oh, wait, that study. Oh, that presentation looks so interesting." So we end up ditching everybody and then at
13:02
the end we're like, "Wait, where are you guys? It's lunchtime. So let's let's eat together." So then we rejoin together
13:08
and then we get separated again because the topics that they were presenting was
13:14
no longer it's like oh we should be together. It's no longer like that. It was more of like each of us had a very
13:21
different motivation and different u view of our perspectives on nursing and
13:26
each of us were more like interested in specific contents. For me, I was
13:33
interested in like emergency nurses or the retention of the advanced
13:38
practitioner in the ER. All those like studies were such an like heart for me.
13:45
But then Christina was more of like oh there's a leadership, oh there's a education, there's a AI usage in the
13:52
healthc care field. So then she was awesome session.
13:57
So it was very interesting focus and of the topic that each of the nurses had a
14:04
choice to choose. It was such a wide variety of buffet for us and it's just
14:11
so wonderful. I completely agree. I think going into
14:17
this when we saw this general schedule we saw okay so from we have like about an hour to go to concurrent sessions but
14:23
it was only when I looked further into the app and looking all the specific details of oh who was presenting what
14:29
were they presenting on and then they were also having like multiple presentations all happening at the same
14:34
time. Uh I know Kennedy and I kind of we kind of struggled for a little bit. We were trying to figure out okay which one
14:40
do we really want to see and what time is it so we can be there. We would have instances where there would be two
14:46
concurrent sessions that would be happening at the same time that we wanted to go to. So sometimes we that's
14:52
when we had to learn that okay maybe if we split up then we can just talk about it when we get back. But yeah this
14:59
this map or this schedule for the weekend I feel like is just the very surface of what there was at the
15:07
conference. So it was very enriching, very insightful and very inspiring to
15:12
learn from all these nurses that did their project. Absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah. And I I I
15:18
guess like we kind of use this as like a little map and then we use the app as like the true like details to all the
15:23
things, right? So and it was almost like you have to have both and you have to use them concurrently and say, "Okay, I want this and then I'm going to go this
15:29
and this is the time." And it was it was great to actually have both. Absolutely.
15:35
All right.
15:40
Yep. So, this is BHS and I's presentation that we went ahead and presented at Sigma and it's improving
15:48
sleep quality and adolescent health. And so, where this really stemmed off was from was when we were in our junior one
15:56
clinical. it was their mental health and community rotation and we were able to go to San Jose Unified District one
16:03
of their schools and work with adolescence in that community and it was a full circle moment for myself just
16:08
because I am from San Jose and being in those type of districts you see as a
16:14
student you see what is around you but then looking outside as a nursing student now looking at those students
16:20
you see so it's a whole different perspective and what we really saw was that sleep wasn't prevalent in schools
16:27
at all. It was barely talked about. All of the students would come into the health office with such
16:35
unhappiness and just not being able to function properly and you see that and
16:40
you want to help them, but what we're saying may not be what's beneficial to them or may not be what they want in
16:47
that moment. So, just creating a safe space for them. We were able to see that with Greg and Susan who we were worked
16:53
closely with. And so our goal was to then inform adolescence about the impact of sleep quality. And by that we created
17:00
a pamp uh what was it? A a poster poster. Yeah, it was a mini poster that
17:07
we could hand out to students. And you'll see it in the next photos. And just doing that you could see their
17:12
interest sparked but only for that little time period. So then we knew we wanted to progress and make this bigger.
17:17
How can we make an impact on these students by not just being another teacher saying this is what you need to
17:23
do. this is how you do it. But instead talking to them, saying, "Hey, how many
17:28
hours of sleep did you get last night? Did you eat dinner? Did you have spend time with your family before going to
17:35
bed? Did you take a shower? Were you able to read a book?" And so that's where we in included the sleep hygiene,
17:42
the healthy sleep, and doing more research on how much sleep should these students be getting in general. And if
17:48
B, you want to incorporate our findings kind of and why we wanted to do
17:53
more than just that. Yeah, of course. I just want to add on. So when we when Kennedy and I went
18:00
to the middle school, we first just had like a little flyer of little information of oh why you should be
18:06
receiving sleep, why you should be getting enough sleep, and how it affects like your physical health, your mental health, how you feel. and
18:14
then after that day, after that health teaching at the San Jose Unified School District, we decided to take our
18:21
findings that we learned from the students and then we put it into this poster to bring to Sigma. So some of our
18:27
findings were that I feel like unsurprisingly unfortunately that these students do not get enough sleep. and
18:34
there are many factors that go into it such as the screen time, the lack of bedtime routine, family dynamic. we
18:40
learned. I think that surprised me the most had like a great impact on how students or adolescents go to sleep
18:47
in their nighttime routine. I think it's because a lot of what the students will see with their parents might be is
18:55
is a pretty good indicator of how they will take on for their entire lives or for the rest of their lives as they
19:01
become adults. So I think it's really so important for parents to also set good
19:08
rules for their students as well so that they may implement those and take those on with them as they grow up. as well
19:15
as there are other things that also contribute to their sleep which are social activities and unhealthy eating
19:21
habits. So it really just shows like holistically like these students do need to be supported especially as an
19:29
adolescence in middle school just so that it could also prep them for when they're older. so our evaluation for
19:36
the research is that we do need to uh improve adolescent sleep quality and implementing and Kennedy and I wanted to
19:44
start by just implementing our teaching. So these students, I
19:50
don't know if they'll remember us in a few years, but maybe hopefully that they remembered like, oh yeah, there's these
19:55
two girls, nursing students. They gave us like a purple flyer saying, oh, sleep was important and it helped me,
20:02
I needed to sleep so that I could be help be stronger in sports or I can perform better with my grades. so we
20:10
just hope that the earlier the primary prevention of all of these possible
20:15
later on difficulties might be prevented with our teaching.
20:20
Very nice. Yeah. I also wanted to include sorry one last thing was that this teaching that
20:27
we did just coming off of a flyer and now presenting it to Sigma in this type of way means that we can take this
20:34
research even further and may possibly come back to Sigma which a lot of the professionals that we've met suggested
20:40
us to do which I found so motivating to becoming a nurse and after graduation as
20:46
well because although it's evidence-based practice this is it comes in steps it's not just here are all my
20:52
findings This is what happened. This is I truly believe that if you have an idea and you want to research something,
20:58
start small like we did the flyer. Then go to Sigma possibly if you can do
21:04
something and show them these are my findings for now. But then also emphasize that any with any project
21:10
further research can be done and hopefully B and I will be able to come back together in the future and
21:17
progress what we have learned.
21:22
That's actually a really good point too. That's something that's I think a big takeaway from like this entire
21:27
experience is that a lot of the people that had been presenting to us they didn't just like say okay this is my
21:33
research and now I'm done. It was like lifelong research right that they kept on building and kept on growing and then
21:39
it's like the more they did research on this and they had to like segue and do something else also. So it was
21:44
absolutely fascinating. My research, my project was about
21:51
primary care provider education. And one thing I really enjoyed about this experience was that I got to
21:59
basically like one-on-one talk to my audience, right? So, it depends if like the poster person next to me was a BSN
22:05
person and she did a phenomenal project. So, I got to listen to her and her presentation basically about her
22:11
research and then uh, she came and talked to me about mine. And so I had the perspective of like, okay, how do I
22:16
tailor my project to uh the audience of someone who is a BSN student versus
22:22
someone who is already a provider, right? And so that looked very different. But and then also too,
22:28
there were people from like Korea who came by and saw my poster and you know just just all around the world and and
22:34
it was all around the United States and it was just so fascinating to see kind of like the the exchange of
22:40
information. So my our project or my project was about the diabetes
22:46
resources that we have available online and basically connecting that information to primary care providers to
22:52
help them shape their practice in how they give their education to their
22:58
diabetes patients. So I did a lot of research on like what kind of
23:05
background do we have on like what education does do providers get some
23:12
things on like what are some potentially lacking areas right and I did my gap analysis on going to a provider's
23:18
practice and seeing you know what resources do you give to people what do you what do you feel comfortable with
23:24
do you understand G-code billing for specifically for diabetes do you know your resources online and then
23:32
like do you just refer out to a specialist, right? And so I kind of really got a chance to look at some of the practices that they have and it
23:40
was really interesting because some of what I was seeing in practice was supported by research really and so
23:47
so it was fascinating and then what I extrapolated from those experiences was
23:52
that basically diabetes self-management education and support really has to be tailored to the individual person which
23:59
makes sense in a lot of avenues but it should include digital platforms so that we can reach more of a wide wide
24:06
variety of students and also um and there has to be some type of like
24:11
billing aspect to understanding what providers can do, right? Because that's kind of like um an element of um return
24:19
on investment really. And so, um, my project included, uh, a five-point
24:24
lightguard scale to assess baseline, uh, patients, uh, providers comfortability
24:30
with, uh, G-code billing, um, available resources online, um, how to address
24:36
barriers, um, to diabetes self-management education and support, um, when to refer to a specialist, um,
24:43
and a number of other elements. Then I gave them um basically like a walkthrough online of like some things
24:49
that they have available, a PowerPoint presentation on some of the things that they can use and I really highlighted
24:55
the CDC's um diabetes self-management education and support toolkit. So that
25:01
was a resource that many of them didn't know existed. And so, um, basically afterwards, I did another fivepoint
25:07
Lyard scale, um, survey, and I included some, um, some other questions that were
25:12
a little bit more about, um, general, like, did your practice change? Is there anything any feedback that I can get
25:19
from you, right? And I kept it a little bit more general. Um, and it was my my sample size was small. It was only two
25:25
providers, but it was a really good pilot, right? And and again to springboard off of what um Kennedy was
25:30
saying about like you know just using that information and then you can also do more research on it, right? This was
25:36
just like a stepping stone and it could be something further on.
25:43
Very nice. Very nice. So this is about um faith-based
25:50
transitional care model. So we uh my project is about pretty much to address
25:55
the readmission rate through utilizing a faith community nurses but at this
26:01
moment the ANA is no longer um providing a certification. Therefore, it is more of a volunteer faith community nurses.
26:08
And this whole pilot project was to establish the common knowledge and verbatim and also the understanding the
26:16
foundation knowledge about what is faith uh based transitional care model is
26:21
about and what is the volunteers that is going to volunteer for this program are
26:27
expected to like what are their responsibilities and roles and those were um the knowledge attainment was um
26:35
assessed by uh our wonderful Dr. Zebra who is actually a creator of
26:41
faith a community nurse transitional care model. Um she was uh help she
26:47
helped me to create a tool um to uh assess the knowledge attainment of our
26:54
church volunteers our community church volunteers in Selenus um to see if they
27:01
truly understood projectled um education offering regards to faith-based um
27:07
community health nurses with transitional care model. So transitional
27:12
care model it is different than home health nursing. Um it's because the
27:18
traditional care model is solely focused on a patient who get admitted at the
27:23
hospital within 30 to 90 days and check if uh their disease are qualifying in
27:31
one of the hospital readmission rate redu reduction program that is um in uh
27:37
rolled out here in California Medicaid systems. And if these patients who are
27:43
admitted in those specific criteria of the chronic and the conditions comes
27:48
back to the hospital within 30 to 90 days, the hospital actually loses a
27:54
certain percentage of the reimbursement from the CMS. Therefore, my project
27:59
somehow got very interested at my work here in Selen's Valley Health Hospital
28:06
because our hospital is the only community hospital that is first magnetic hospital out of whole central
28:13
coast region. Second, this hospital uh due to the evidence-based practice that
28:19
one of the master level nurses proposed about creating a transitional care department and now this hospital has
28:27
transitional care department, the one and only department that is in the hospital here in Central Coast. What a
28:34
great story, right? the nursesled project finally shown and I am carrying that torch again not only for the
28:41
hospital but I am trying to carry that torch to the community um health. So,
28:47
I'm trying to reach out to the hos uh community churches who are really uh
28:53
keen on their um elders because I personally experienced one of my elders
28:59
passed away in cardiac um arrest during the fishing trip, but he had a cardiac
29:06
um surgery like stent placed twice and all that. And he yet still failed to
29:11
understand what he truly had and he did not manage his condition well and he
29:18
passed away and that become the passion of my project and this project basically successfully uh recruited 15 church
29:26
members who are health care professionals. So I I was very fortunate enough to had a two MD residents and I
29:34
had one medical um doctor and then I also had three PAs and um social workers
29:42
and it was just wonderful how they showed the passion and they did
29:47
understand the training materials that I did offer to them and as you can see my
29:52
p value was 0.0023 0023 on our group meaning they understood they understood
29:57
the content and they were fully ready to um go for this project. When I presented
30:04
this um project at uh Sigma many people were very confused. They did not know
30:10
what faith committed nurse was and they did not know there was a such a a program as transitional care program.
30:17
And um some of the nurses were like this is the this is the exact program that we need at our state or one of the
30:25
Mongolian nurse came to me and she was like wait what did you say what was the
30:30
what was the model and and it was just um great to know that not many nurses
30:37
are familiar what readmission rate does is to the hospital. Um so I think that
30:43
is one of the uh registration side that um United State kind of kicked in to
30:50
attempt to address it and I had such a great wonderful time here and sharing
30:56
just one perspective that nobody was familiar with.
31:03
I think that's great. That's awesome. Yeah. Okay. Back to you, Kennedy.
31:09
Yeah. So, I don't think there's enough words to describe my experience at Sigma. Um, I truly wish each and every
31:16
person I know was able to come with me just because because being there is different than explaining it. So,
31:23
attending the Sigma Congress was a highly meaningful experience. Like I said, it was motivating to be recognized
31:29
and encouraged for my involvement and I appreciated the opportunity to learn from so many diverse and compassionate
31:37
um professionals. While I listened to many speakers and presentations throughout the entire weekend, the one
31:42
that stuck out um to me the most was learning about the four Rs, which is refresh, reframe, remember, and
31:48
resources as they allowed me to reflect on my growth as a nursing student. The conference really helped uh me refresh
31:55
my foundational knowledge about global health and evidence-based practice. I learned how important research is in is
32:01
in supporting preventative care and how we can reframe healthc care um to focus more on wellness not just illness and
32:08
our care begins with the knowledge we gain and the insights we uncover together ultimately. So from that I
32:15
wanted to just make bullet points. So expanding um global health knowledge
32:20
like I mentioned I learned new nursing concepts I never heard of before. I gained a deeper understanding of how
32:27
healthcare systems and challenges vary worldwide. It's not all the same at all. And then exposure to real world um case
32:34
studies and evidence-based practices. In a picture coming up um it shows a woman and I whose project was on sepsis among
32:40
postpartum mothers from Bangladesh. And just walking through these posters, it felt like a museum. And she just so
32:47
happened to be there. And I kind of glanced because I was still nervous to go up to people, but you she was very
32:53
welcoming. And we took a picture together and I was like, "Thank you for sharing this. It's so amazing to hear
32:59
that this is what's going on in this part of the world that I had no idea about." And then another one just down
33:05
the row was about um highfidelity simulation training on pediatric nurses
33:10
competence and seizure management but it was from Taiwan and this p presenter wasn't there but it made me have so many
33:17
questions like are there health care systems like ours are the schools that they that are there teaching their
33:23
students what we're learning and so having those questions I made sure to write them down and share later on and
33:29
which leads me to applying skill through presentation Um when BHS and I presented
33:34
our project, we had to organize a way for this specific event just because we
33:40
came from um informing children and then to faculty members. But now this was to
33:46
strangers. We had no idea who we would see. And it was funny story actually. One of this really nice lady came up to
33:52
us with her camera and said, "Okay, you have two minutes to give me your presentation." And Vus and I couldn't
33:58
make any faces or anything, but we were like, "Okay, we got this. Be confident." And so that's what that's what built our
34:04
confidence was having people believe in us. And although we may have been the youngest people there, they truly did
34:11
not see us any different. And I'm very thankful for that because having so many
34:16
different levels, they still encourage us and that motivates me to keep going and make sure that I make them proud in
34:22
a way kind of like how I make um parents proud, teachers proud and everything like that. And so it practiced critical
34:28
thinking skills well, responding to feedback, quick questions. We didn't have no time to think. It's on the fly.
34:34
And I feel like as a nursing student, you're you're some people may be nervous for that, but Beatress and I had to like
34:40
channel our inner future nurses and just give them the answers that we felt was best. And so then again um leading to my
34:49
next point is that we were able to connect our theory to practice. So just like we learned in classroom concepts,
34:55
we applied to talking to other people. um we understood like global health
35:00
challenging from multiple perspectives instead of just one tiny perspective and so then we were able to bridge nursing
35:06
theories as well with like an international health concerns and which was very interesting and I believe I
35:13
want to say that this was a beautiful experience to bridge into our way into senior year just because now we actually
35:20
get to learn about adolescent health and see what our findings and what we could do different and I'm very thankful that
35:26
our curriculum provides such amazing um feedback as well. Um I also gained
35:33
cultural competence awareness um interacted with peer professionals from different cultures. I realized the
35:39
importance of cultural sensitive and patient care and teamwork as well developed a broader worldview and
35:44
appreciation for diversity in nursing. It's so important for me that diversity in nursing is essential because it
35:51
enhances the cultural competence allowing nurses to provide more respectful and effective care and still
35:56
learning that as a nursing student and being able to imp that implement that in clinicals early now allows me to um to
36:04
get better as I become a nurse as well. Um it inspired I was inspired by the global passion. Um I felt inspired by
36:12
the dedication of nurses worldwide talking with nurses and researchers from every single part of the world. Um it's
36:19
important to understand each other because we all have different viewpoints but our one purpose is caring for
36:25
someone uh which is very beautiful to me again and there's moments of pride and
36:30
emotion um seeing shared passion. What I felt I like I said cannot put into words
36:36
the interactions I've made with people and simply them passing by our
36:42
presentation made me feel honored and that I was being heard for what I truly believe in and what I want to share more
36:48
of and it reinforced the comm my commitment to nursing and global health equity. It was a reminder of why I chose
36:55
nursing to make a real impact no matter how big or small it is and it has how
37:00
the profession has such a big community and village to support me in doing so. So I know that I made the right choice
37:06
and I was exactly where I needed to be while at Sigma. And finally, a motivated
37:12
lifelong learning mindset. As Christina has mentioned, I saw the importance of continuous education. I felt inspired
37:19
and challenged at the same time. I now see that learning how to learn means
37:24
asking better questions and believing I can and will change systems. I'm eager to further my research um and take part
37:32
in projects all over the world that help improve policies. And I learned the value of staying curious. And I even
37:39
learned in class this past week that you are learning something new every day, whether that's in your personal life or
37:45
professional. And so from this experience overall, I'm committed to staying informed and becoming a
37:51
self-directed learner. I've gained tools, ideas, and mentors that will guide me through this next chapter,
37:57
especially entering my senior year and my transition into gradu um life after graduation as a new grad.
38:11
Here are some pictures I wanted to share as well. As I mentioned, um very nice lady in the upper right hand corner, um
38:17
in her presentation, she wanted to take a picture. Is it okay? Is it okay if I get one too as well? And a special thank
38:23
you to Beatress for creating this project with me. If it wasn't for her, we would not be where we were at today.
38:30
Um, especially Dr. Mary Lou who believed in us, who knew we could go to the next
38:36
level. And just being sharing that experience with her was truly amazing. And little snippets of of Sigma, the big
38:44
museum like poster boards I was telling you about. And each presentation had a
38:50
schedule right in front of its door as well.
38:56
All right, Kennedy, I feel like you spoke so beautifully. I think that was a great encapsulation of our experience.
39:02
Um, but yeah, similar to what Kennedy said, I feel like words cannot even begin to describe all the emotions, all
39:09
the feelings, the entire weekend. Um, everything that we felt that entire weekend. Um really it was so inspiring
39:18
to see so many nurses. is I feel like when Kennedy and I came there at 9:00 a.m. on the Friday that the conference
39:25
started. Um it was just so overwhelming but at the same time it was so
39:32
incredibly like it's sorry I feel like I'm at a loss for words but um it was just so
39:38
inspiring just to see everyone and it was such an immense feeling to feel like oh you were with people from all over
39:45
the world and you could really feel that and you could feel and hear the spirit and the pride from all the other people
39:52
from the different countries the like different states within the s um and globally like I was talking to a woman
39:58
from Dubai like around the Dubai area then there are other people from Texas they're from Utah um I also saw some
40:06
people from like Taiwan and just there's so many people around the world and you
40:11
realize we were all gathered here for this one congress for just to share our
40:16
learning and to share the experiences and to share what they have all been researching and feel so passionately
40:22
about and for every single um concurrent session that I sat into, I
40:28
just felt so inspired um listening to them cuz everything they spoke about,
40:33
even if I had no prior knowledge about the topic, it just made me want to learn more about it. um and their passion and
40:40
their drive for their topic was truly inspiring to see like these people like
40:45
similar to again what Kenny Kennedy said earlier people devote their lives to a particular research project or they
40:52
continue building off of the research that they find and then they like until probably there's no end or they just
40:58
keep wanting to learn more about whatever topic they feel so passionately about and that I found was really truly
41:06
incredible to witness Um, so yeah, with all the concurrent sessions, there were
41:12
again so many that I wanted to sit into, but I feel like there just wasn't enough time or there would I just if I could
41:18
duplicate myself and then put each one in each different room and then take notes, I wish I could cuz it was there
41:25
was just a plethora of information and good just presentations that there were
41:31
to be heard that I wish I could listen to every single one, but it just wasn't humanly possible with the thousands of
41:37
people um that were here at this conference. Um but yeah, so we connected
41:43
from people from all over the world. it like I knew it was global, but stepping
41:50
foot into the hotel and then just fully seeing hearing like all the different flags, all the different like languages
41:56
you'd hear, the different accents, it truly did feel like, oh, I am one small
42:02
person in this big world of incredible people um and incredible nurses that are
42:08
trying to make a difference in just our world entirely. Um, so I feel like that
42:14
was just such an amazing experience. Such I feel so blessed to be of to have
42:21
been nominated for this. So, and I also thank Kennedy for the teamwork that we
42:26
had and through the teamwork that we had in creating this project and as well as
42:32
what got us through the weekend itself. Um, Kennedy and I have been working on this together for a while now and thank
42:39
you again Dr. Datal for kind of encouraging me and Kennedy even to present at the evening of evidence cuz I
42:46
feel like it would be the email for the evening of evidence was something that like I feel like many students would see
42:52
but either they didn't have the um motivation or the encouragement or the support to show up. So with Dr. Datitali
43:00
on our side and saying like oh yeah you guys should present your um project like I think it would be fun. Um, Kennedy and
43:06
I kind of looked at each other and said, "Okay, like at least we have one another. Um, we can do it." And I think
43:12
that just support was incredibly impactful for how we even got here. Um,
43:18
I never would have thought that saying yes to Dr. Mary Lou's, um, oh, why don't you present at the evening of evidence
43:24
would have got us to be a rising star at Sigma and then would have got us to Seattle. Um, getting to talk to people
43:31
from all over the world. So, thank you so much for this experience. Um, I also
43:38
mentioned that I was inspired. I feel like the word that I keep using is inspired. Um, but after this semester, I
43:47
was actually previously um told that I could be I could apply for the 4 plus
43:53
one at um USF, the BSN MSN program. Um, and after learning more about it, I just
43:59
realized how incredibly like how it is such a good opportunity for me to take.
44:06
Um, and I think after going to this Sigma conference, it just made me want
44:12
to it just made me even more excited to start my MSN journey, too. So, even
44:18
despite even though I haven't even graduated from my BSN yet, um I'm so
44:24
already excited to start my higher education. I'm already excited to start um my masters at USF. Um
44:32
yes. Um yeah. And then talking to so many nurse researchers when we sat at a networking table with me and Kennedy. I
44:39
think we were just talking to like people were all kind of just sharing their
44:45
um their projects with one another and you could just feel the passion with their tone with their research that like
44:51
when they were networking it truly did feel like networking in front of our eyes. like Kennedy and I I feel like I
44:57
had a moment where I just had to like sit back a little bit and just watch that these people were fully just
45:03
connecting with one another, networking with one another. Um, one person that was sitting next to me was talking to a
45:09
different woman from Finland. Um, and they' had written multiple articles on
45:15
um the research databases and she asked like, "Oh, do you know this person from Finland?" And then the woman from
45:22
Finland said like, "Oh, yeah. I think I know that person like, oh, I connected with them. So then they were trying to
45:28
exchange contact information so that they can build upon um their own research projects. And I just thought it
45:34
was incredible to see that the names that we'd see on the databases were real people and the faces behind some of them
45:40
and that they really were like just so passionate about their project that they were even able to connect to one
45:46
another. So, it made me feel like, wow, this world is so big and yet it's also so small at the same time that what are
45:53
the chances that they're sitting at the same table that they're able to help one another pursue um their research
45:59
further. So, I just thought that was incredible. Yeah, thank you again for this
46:04
opportunity. It really is so amazing that we're able to be part of this.
46:14
Oh, yes. And then this is just more pictures. This first one to the very left was actually taken from the school
46:20
nurse Greg from Castileo Middle School in San Jose. Um, and this was what our
46:25
teaching looked like for the students. So, here are the middle schoolers that we just kind of just sat down at a table
46:32
during their lunch break and then they would kind of obviously they'd see like people like, "Oh, these girls don't look
46:38
like their classmates or middle schoolers as well." So, I thought it was just very fascinating that we were just
46:45
able we had the opportunity to just sit down at a table. We were able to hand out flyers. Um, and something that isn't
46:50
pictured here, but I think was pictured on our poster was the sleep tracker. So, that's where students um were able to
46:58
kind of log out the date, how many hours of sleep they got, um, and most importantly, how did they feel the next
47:03
morning? So, that did they feel ready for the day or did they feel tired? Did they feel like they couldn't focus? Um
47:10
cuz that truly is the most important part of how you feel each time you wake up. And then these other two pictures,
47:16
this middle one is a picture that Kennedy and I took behind that Sigma background. And then the one to the very
47:22
right is with a woman named Bernardet Melanink I believe is her name. Uh she
47:28
was the opening plenary speaker that Karolina like actually um advised us to
47:33
go listen to. And she was truly inspiring. I looked up I looked her up on her LinkedIn afterwards and I saw the
47:40
f her first title wasn't I was expecting her to say like oh her first title was to be a nurse but her first title was
47:46
actually motivational speaker and I could really feel that from her um from
47:52
her presentation when I think she was the great way to kick off the weekend event because she really was just truly
47:59
inspiring with her words. She knew how to get to the root of each person, each
48:04
nurse, and each person that was sitting in that room. So, I think it was incredible that we were able to kind of
48:09
just meet her, shake her hand, like give her a hug, and then also take a picture with her. That's great.
48:20
All right, this is neat. Okay, so first of all, Kennedy and Beatric already said everything, so if we could just say ditto.
48:27
Um, but yeah, absolutely. to to to reiterate, right? Say the same things over, but um I love the global
48:35
perspective, right? You walk into the room and you really just feel like I'm I'm only in United States, but man, I'm
48:41
so glad everybody else speaks English because because everybody was able to communicate together and it was just
48:47
this huge broadened sense of of how massive and then how lucky we were to
48:53
all be together, right? It was a huge like a combination of both that that I'm
48:58
only one little tiny speck and this is it's wonderful to be part of this whole big piece of a puzzle, right? Um the
49:06
other thing that I loved about this experience was that it was evidence-based, right? So I I put faith
49:12
in the facts. So like I wasn't trying to convince other people and other people weren't trying to convince me anything.
49:18
They were just stating, hey, these are the facts. This is what we learned. This is what we did. This is the outcome and
49:23
this is what we learned from it. Right. And it was just fascinating to see just the the evidence behind everything. Um,
49:30
and I know I remember u meeting some of um the authors of an evidence-based book
49:35
while I was there. And I even had them sign the book of like, hey, like how do I hone in on research questions, right?
49:42
Because how do I like by the time I got to my project, it took like many meetings of meeting with the librarian,
49:50
looking up this, searching it this way, trying to figure it out that way, and then lo and behold, the ultimate like
49:55
project that it ended up being was very different than the first thing I I researched, right? So, how do we like
50:02
fine-tune that research process, right? And so, the there's lots of great advice and lots of great conversations on like
50:09
how to shape um future research. Also it was very interesting. Um the concurrent
50:16
sessions there was just research about everything like a thousand different topics of everything things that I had
50:23
both had some knowledge on and things that I had never heard of and it was so interesting to hear even the people that
50:29
I had not heard of anything about um and then connect it to their face, right?
50:35
moving that that research like reading the article and then like connecting it to the researcher themselves and then
50:41
being able to like meet them and then connect with them and then you know exchange numbers or even um just kind of
50:48
like professionally find them on LinkedIn um and then just like learn from them too like learn from not only
50:54
their research itself but their experiences as a researcher and then be able to ask them real questions right
51:00
because when you read something and you're like oh wait I don't understand why we did it this way instead live that way. You can actually ask them in real
51:07
life. You can ask the person who did the research for, you know, let's say 10 years. Um, and then you get a real life
51:13
response and it's not an email. It's like a real person. And it's just a phenomenal way to really like like wrap
51:21
your head around what was actually being done and then the impact on it on on patients, right, that it actually had on
51:27
patients. And so it was a wonderful experience entirely, but it was
51:32
something that was very different and unique like to walk into like a global research conference like that sounds great, but then what did you actually
51:39
like do with that, right? How did we interact with people from all over the world and it was just it was a great
51:46
experience to say the least. Also, there was great coffee in Seattle.
51:52
That was awesome. It was I didn't know I was going to be such a a coffee connoisseur when I walked in there and we got some free coffee tickets. It was
51:58
a lot of fun. Um this was just a quick snapshot of what the concurrent sessions
52:04
um looked like. Right. So the picture was of um one of the concurrent sessions. Um this was actually one of
52:10
the AI ones that Laura had made alluded to. Um and it was looking at um some of
52:17
the responses. So like looking at previous AI um and it would give them like instructions of like hey create
52:23
this simulation or how would I respond to my kid when they're feeling sick right and then it in the progression of
52:30
AI and how to see how AI has advanced a year later um they did the same question
52:36
and with those advances what does that question look like right and they were comparing chat GBT with Google Gemini
52:42
and the responses were just really cool and fascinating right so that was just one small topic IC and then each
52:49
concurrent session had multiple speakers in each one. So concession A concurrent session A I went to those two and then B
52:57
was all of those in one room. Con concurrent session C was those two, right? And those are just ABC. So then
53:03
to go to D, E, F, H, I G, it was just it was a whole list of everything, right?
53:09
So this was just like a little snapshot of just a little bit of the titles of information that we got things from. And
53:15
I just remember um Laura and I went to one of the sessions in which it was like a mic drop moment and we like I started
53:21
clapping. It was just one of those times where you're like, "Oh my gosh, that makes so much sense." But it makes sense because you're saying it, right? And so
53:28
this research that people have really spent a lot of time developing um just
53:33
was was really really interesting, just phenomenal. Also, we met amazing people, right? So,
53:41
we connected with one another, of course. We met people from John's Hopkins. Um, we met um what is his name?
53:48
Uh, Lucas Davis, right? And he's the Sigma chief executive officer. We got a chance to meet Burns. We got a chance to
53:56
just hang out and go eat dinner and lunch and, you know, meet people from like there was a guy from India that we
54:02
hang out hung out with and had lunch with. Um, there were people from just different walks of life and it was just
54:08
such a good experience to see how diverse we were all collectively together, right? It wasn't like, hey,
54:13
this is what a nurse looks like. Nope. There was no, we were just so different. It was so wonderful to see how different
54:20
we could be. And then all the things that we did, uh, Laura and I even had time to work out every day. My rings
54:26
were all closed. Uh, we tried the free coffees. We tried the lobster dinners.
54:33
We had we went to France and had some phenomenal chocolate that we had to bring home for our families. Uh, we went
54:39
to a baseball game and I won a free ticket. It was just such a great experience. Um, by the way, I never win
54:46
anything, but I won a baseball ticket. Like, it just what are the odds, right? Um, I woke up in time to see the
54:52
sunrise. It was just such a good experience all around. We went to the purple store and so that little quote uh
54:58
never question my purpeness. One of our friends that we met there uh loves purple like she was just wearing purple
55:04
every single day and so we went to the purple store for her and it was it was just such a fun experience really um
55:12
that just in all avenues, right? It was an academic experience. It was inspiring and we got some really great um just
55:19
connections with one another. It was it was phenomenal.
55:25
So, I knew Christina was gonna cover our epic moments.
55:31
By the time that I was preparing my experience, I saw all these pictures and
55:36
wonderful stuff and I was just like, "Okay, I'm just going to focus on practicality."
55:42
You got it. So, first of, so as you can see in that poor photo of mine, uh, when I first
55:50
arrived, I wasn't dressed formal. So, I was like, "Oh my goodness, this is not
55:57
representing USF correctly. I am going to go to the restroom and change my
56:03
outfit." So then I went to the restroom and change it. But then one of the kind
56:08
Sigma member who was leading one this um conference she said oh I will hold on to
56:15
this poster and I will put your name on it and I will keep it here. So then I
56:21
thought my poster was going to be stay there the entire time before I do the presentation.
56:28
Oh, I had a a very interesting experience of searching for my poster
56:35
from the seventh, sixth, and fifth and fourth floor of the hotel.
56:40
But I think it was such a practical advice that I can give out to people.
56:46
Do not let go of your poster. And then um dawn your mask. I was the
56:54
only person who got sick in this trip. Um so I did not wear mask in the
57:00
airport. I did not wear mask in the um conference. I did not wear mask thinking
57:06
that I'm a superhuman and I did get sick on the third day and poor Christina was
57:13
just taking care of me like a mama bear on the last day. Um so yes, dress formal
57:20
from the start. So from the airplane to the conference, please wear formal
57:27
because you can readily available to attend the conference. I learned that
57:33
you have to be cordious and kind and patient. Because when I was like, "Oh, who is this tall guy? He looks very
57:39
nice. He dressed very nice." And it turns out it was Look, our chief
57:45
executive officer, look. And then he was like, "Hi, how are you?
57:51
What's your name? Where are you from? What university are you guys from?" And then we were sharing all this. And then
57:56
of course I said, "We thought Sigma was a scam because we got this email and
58:05
they're saying they're wonderful, but we don't know what exactly it is." And um
58:10
Luke said, "Yeah, that is our work in progress right now." So, I guess we kind
58:16
of gave him a good feedback on that. So, um yeah, be cordious and kind and
58:21
patient and be professional because you do not know when you're going to meet your CEO of Sigma theata.
58:29
And um have fun. I really have fun. We met so I'm I'm the person who really
58:37
have a hard time stepping first step to join into the crowd. So like uh when I
58:43
was so I'm still having hard time to be a nurse practitioner because I feel like
58:49
their life is in my hand and I just don't want to harm them and that fear
58:54
kept me looking for a job. And um Christina showed you guys a picture of
59:00
these wonderful two ladies that we met at John Hopkins. Um these two ladies, Melissa, she was so supportive. She
59:09
said, "Laura, you have so much different nursing background. You can do this." She was building us. She was um prepping
59:16
us like, "Don't be afraid to be a nurse practitioner." Because she said, "It has
59:21
to start somewhere." And and she really built me up. Um Yeah. Right. Right. Oh,
59:27
I think one more right there. So, she is the person who's
59:33
like right next to me. Yeah. That's Melissa. She and I have a similar background. So
59:39
er and all all the Oh yeah and that that look right in the between us that's the
59:44
time we met and talked about like oh we thought Sigma was scam. So that whole
59:50
conversation um but yes I think the practicality wise the sigma conference like be ready always be ready because
59:57
you are presenting your university and I really took pride I really care that
1:00:05
each of us I think me Christina Kennedy and Beatatrice we we really understood
1:00:11
that we are representing for University of San Francisco and we understood what it means to us and when we carried
1:00:18
ourselves self. We did carry oursel proud and we did carry oursel that this is not just me but it is our advisors,
1:00:28
our um you know school deans and all wonderful board members and all these
1:00:36
support that has poured into us. that is now time to shine and support that other
1:00:44
fellow you know students that you can be the one and this event
1:00:51
again beatress right inspiring motivating like how Kennedy was saying and how Christ is saying eyeoping
1:00:59
I think it really summed up all that because I honestly thought like okay
1:01:06
this is it I'm done no more. I am not going to do this again.
1:01:11
But then I signed myself up in our work um clinical inquiry committee right now.
1:01:19
So I'm in one of the member of our hospital that I am helping doing evidence-based pro uh project
1:01:27
uh and I am going into all these committees. Um it's been since I'm in a central council. So I'm going to all
1:01:33
these committees of uh people and saying like hey evidence-based practice is not
1:01:40
something foreign to you. It is not something difficult because I used to
1:01:46
think that and then I am now motivating other nurses to do it and I can see that
1:01:51
struggle and uh misunderstanding of how poor that EVP can be portrayed to the
1:01:58
nurses. So, I'm gonna continue and I wish I see my colleagues again at the
1:02:04
Sigma conference again. Very nice.
1:02:12
All right. So, I wanted to highlight um also that's Laura. That was my picture
1:02:17
that I took of her. Um the vision mission that Sigma has um
1:02:24
let me okay so the vision for Sigma was that um it's that connected empowered
1:02:29
nurses nurse leaders transform global healthcare right and that was so
1:02:35
embodied in this conference um developing nurse leaders anywhere to improve health care everywhere right and
1:02:42
again that global perspective was just so incredible to experience right to
1:02:49
just see how many people are all together doing all the things. And then to connect it to USF, um I put an
1:02:57
excerpt of part of our mission statement and our our values, right? So um
1:03:05
as a community we empower and hold accountable our students, faculty, librarians, staff, administrators,
1:03:11
alumni and community partners to be persons for and with others to care for
1:03:16
our common home including the native lands in on which our campus resides and
1:03:22
to promote a common good by critically, thoughtfully and innovatively addressing
1:03:27
inequalities to create a more humane and just world. Right. And I feel like like
1:03:33
those both align so well. At USF we value value value three things in
1:03:39
particular. Kura personalis being the person for others and diversity in all
1:03:44
its forms. So I feel like again bringing Sigma and USF together it just makes so
1:03:50
much sense because so much of it really aligns to that like global perspective that innovation that caring for people
1:03:58
that doing what's right for everyone right. I feel like in that sense of camaraderie al together, right? That was
1:04:03
just so evident in both spaces. And then also that's me and Laura graduating
1:04:08
together. And then this was us packing up to leave right on our way back when we were
1:04:15
commuting. Um we were walking to the whatever public transportation area we
1:04:20
decided to take together because it was going to be way more financially responsible.
1:04:25
So we grabbed our posters and walked our whole way together and then just our own flights home. So it was a great great
1:04:33
experience. I really want to thank everyone who helped support this initiative. Um as you can see from each
1:04:39
of us. We all value this experience so incredibly much. So thank you guys.
1:04:46
Thank you each one of you. This was an awesome presentation. Um I know that we
1:04:52
can stay and and have questions and more conversation. We are running out of time. So um I just want to share with
1:05:00
everyone I put in the chat. We have your reflections on our website. So I did ask
1:05:06
each of the students to put a reflection and it is posted already on our website. I'll post uh this presentation. This was
1:05:13
awesome. Um I think that you represented USF more and Sigma
1:05:19
um also beta chapter uh in an amazing way. So congratulations. I want to thank
1:05:25
again the Sigma Beta Gamma chapter representatives the support that you
1:05:31
provided. Um I think this is this is a great outcome and we're very very proud
1:05:37
of you. U Marylu or Benson do you want to do or Pat do you want to say any closing words?
1:05:44
I um in terms of it's Marylu and I as one of the board members and some other
1:05:50
um individuals might have a minute to say but I just want to say how proud we are because I think it represents our
1:05:56
mission for USF and I know Victoria Chadri and I are friends and I know she attended this as well and she said that
1:06:03
the that she said that it was a pride to see how the students have applied this um the nurses and the FMPs have applied
1:06:11
this to practice. So things have come a long way and we invite you to become more involved cuz we do the same thing
1:06:18
continuously and it's not a scam. It's the real thing and um we want to
1:06:24
encourage more people to participate because we we make this our mission too
1:06:30
to have more service projects to do leadership and for sure to have you have
1:06:35
more opportunities to provide um to to showcase your research. So can please
1:06:41
continue I and I know that Benson you might be on ready to say something or Pat or Sarah.
1:06:47
Yeah absolutely. Thank you Mary Lou. I echo every single word you utter to the team to the groups to the students.
1:06:53
Nothing but really proud and by the way awesome presentations. You guys did a phenomenal jobs and you answer my
1:07:01
questions already which is I was going to ask would you recommend this to your peers to your friends. So absolutely
1:07:07
sounds like you guys had a wonderful time networking, learning, growing. That's exactly what we look for, what
1:07:14
our aim and mission is with not just Sigma but USF and in terms in the biggest sense nursing because really it
1:07:21
is very important that we help support each other. So I do have one ask to all of you share this with your colleagues,
1:07:28
friends, um peers, even family members. Like you said, if if Sigma is a scam,
1:07:33
I've been scammed for 30 years. So I can tell you that much. So please do share this with your loved ones at how proud
1:07:40
we all are for each and every one of you. So congratulations. I also wanted to make a comment. I was
1:07:47
very impressed with the presentations that all of you made. I I really uh it
1:07:53
was amazing and and uh having been a former associate dean at the university in nursing, I couldn't be more proud of
1:08:00
you. Um, if I had been the one that uh that encouraged you as as you have been
1:08:05
encouraged by people like Mary Lou, I think that's just great and I'm glad that you have her there to be able to
1:08:11
give you that encouragement. I'm sure you're you're glad too. And as Benson said, I hope that you letters are going
1:08:19
out now to students to invite them to become members of Sigma. And you're
1:08:24
right. I think and maybe we haven't done as much as a chapter to explain to you
1:08:29
what Sigma is all about or whether people aren't ready to hear about global
1:08:34
practices. But I I hope that you will help those students who do get these letters to recognize that this this um
1:08:43
organization is something that not only benefit benefits them but the world uh
1:08:48
certainly nursing. So thank you again for your presentations. I I thought you
1:08:54
were just marvelous. So, thank you. Love that Pat. Um I'm Sarah. I'm also on
1:09:01
the board and I just want to say that um don't um walk run to get um become a
1:09:08
member. If you are already graduated, you can come back as a nurse leader. Everyone is a nurse leader whether
1:09:14
bedside or you know taking on additional responsibilities. But loved your um
1:09:21
experience. Thank you so much for sharing. Again, you know, um, Sigma is the largest nursing organization
1:09:27
worldwide that connects us all to really be instrumental and influential in
1:09:33
policies and making our, you know, nursing practice safer um, around the
1:09:39
world. So really, really love it and you know, it's a very prestigious organization to be a part of as you saw
1:09:45
you know, firsthand. Um, I went to the, you know, the the biianial,
1:09:51
they call it the bienium and the same thing. So, it's like yours amplified even more with more. It's huge. Um, you
1:10:00
know, like you want to talk about getting your steps in, you're going to get tons of steps in and networking is so key. So, I'm glad you met wonderful,
1:10:07
wonderful people who have been um exemplary contributors to the nursing profession and practice and keep
1:10:15
carrying that torch cuz no matter what you do, it looks like you guys are all wonderful examples of, you know, nursing
1:10:21
professionalism. So, continue to keep doing that and thank you all. I got to jump to another
1:10:26
meeting, but um please post on LinkedIn, tag me um you know, and then I'll repost
1:10:33
it and share and then we can also put it on our Sigma um website as well. So,
1:10:38
thank you all again. Bye. Thank you everyone. Good job. Thank you.