UNIVERSITY PARK — By choosing a career path in teaching, nurse educators play a critical role in helping to address the country’s nursing shortage.
For National Nurses Week, Monday, May 6, through Sunday, May 12, Penn State recognized nurse educators who graduated from its doctoral program and now teach for the Penn State Ross and Carol Nese College of Nursing.
“I love cultivating new nursing leaders who will bring their expertise to both clinical and non-clinical areas,” said Susan E. Maynard, a 2021 DNP graduate who joined the faculty the same year. “My goal is to empower students to see themselves in a wide range of leadership roles, and I enjoy seeing the transformation from their first class to graduation.”
Mary Alyce Nelson, of Boalsburg, is an associate professor in the Nese College of Nursing and the director of undergraduate nursing education at University Park and for the online RN to BSN program offered through Penn State World Campus. She graduated with a Doctor of Nursing Practice degree in 2019.
In her career, she has worked as a staff nurse, in administration as a director of nursing, and as a director and educator of a hospital-based nursing program. Prior to joining the faculty at Penn State in 2015, she was the director of nursing and assistant director of clinical services for Penn State University Health Services.
“You must try to get to know students and keep them interested,” Nelson said. “They are working as nurses as they are learning, and I love when they apply real-life situations as I am teaching them. They live in different geographic areas and their experiences vary.”
Megan Murphy is a recent graduate of the Doctor of Nursing Practice’s family nurse practitioner program. She began teaching in Penn State’s undergraduate nursing program in 2016 as an adjunct clinical faculty member and became part of the full-time faculty in 2018.
“The inspiration to obtain a doctoral degree came from working in higher education and being surrounded by so many successful nurse researchers, nurse administrators and nurse educators,” Murphy said. “I am very practice-driven, and the DNP degree was most desirable as I always planned to return to clinical practice.”
Murphy worked for the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia in several inpatient units, and when she relocated to State College, she worked in pediatric home health as a nurse educator and supervisor.
“I feel that I am giving back to the nursing profession by educating undergraduate nursing students as they prepare to enter the nursing profession,” Murphy said. “My direction has always been to provide real-world advice and prepare them to be novice nurses who have the right skills to be successful. Nursing provides a wonderful career and only offers them more opportunities for professional growth in a time of shortage.”
Maynard is an assistant teaching professor and clinical placement coordinator. She started her nursing career at Lewistown Hospital, working in telemetry, after graduating with her bachelor’s in 1996. She has worked with the Mayo Clinic in Minnesota, Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore and Stanford Hospital in California. Prior to joining the faculty at Penn State in 2021, she was the stroke coordinator at Mount Nittany Medical Center in State College.
At Penn State, Maynard teaches graduate-level courses and is the clinical placement coordinator. She ensures that graduate nursing students get valuable clinical and practicum experiences.
“I made good friends through the program, and our interactions were almost fully online,” Maynard said. “I had the opportunity to learn about health care environments different from my own and work with other students that had a wide variety of interesting backgrounds.”
