IUBAT students inspire

Sam Simpson visited IUBAT during the fall trimester 2011. She writes, “Since volunteering in the Nursing Program, I have had Bangladesh ‘under my skin’.  I suspect that it will remain there for the rest of my life.  The sheer number of people, how hard they work, the poverty, the noise, the climate and the pollution all made indelible impressions.   And the nursing students took a chunk of my heart and continue to inspire me with their spirit and determination.

It is challenging to compare my experience in Bangladesh with my incredibly comfortable life in rural British Columbia.  How does my experience there inform my life here?   How can I integrate these diametrically opposed realities?  Several months after my return, I gave two presentations to friends and neighbours and the general public.  Organizing these helped me to focus on the important parts of my time at IUBAT.  Presenting my slide shows has not resolved my dilemma of cultural/economic adjustment but has certainly assisted me.   And the modest Canadian dollar donations to the Bangladesh Health Project will translate into many more taka!”

VCC students learning and teaching at IUBAT

This summer, Christine Jhoan Eugenio and other senior students from the Vancouver Community College BSN program completed preceptorships at IUBAT. In the photos, Christine is shown with her classmates, Anastasia Vlasova and Josh Gardiner. Christine writes, “My colleagues and I did a presentation on HIV/AIDS for the junior nursing students.  The presentation mainly focused on the stigma attached to HIV and the importance of providing compassionate care to ALL patients.  We used the Bangladesh Nursing and Midwifery Council Code of Ethics to discuss the professional responsibility of nurses, especially to vulnerable populations such as HIV+ patients.  A puzzle activity called How to provide care to HIV+ patients helped the students understand nurses’ responsibility to provide competent, ethical care. In a group activity, we asked the students to develop a teaching strategy (a skit, a comic, or a poster) to increase awareness about HIV/AIDS and reduce stigma. By developing values such as compassionate nursing care, IUBAT graduates will be able to practice in ways that foster positive images of nursing in Bangladesh.  The students’ comments showed that they enjoyed and learned from our presentation.  One wrote, “It was the best presentation that I had ever seen. I really liked how you involved us and made it so very interesting.  The puzzle and drama helped to make us creative and knowledgeable.” I am glad that I was able to share my nursing knowledge to influence other future nurses.  It was great working with and learning from the IUBAT students. I was impressed by their enthusiasm and creativity and I appreciate how they welcomed us in their classroom and treated us as their peers.

Canada Bangladesh learning exchange

Helen Jiang, (seated in photo) is a recent BSN graduate from Vancouver Community College who completed a preceptorship at IUBAT last month with support from an Irving K. Barber BC Scholarship. Helen writes: “My Bangladesh preceptorship allowed me to re-examine who I really am and my core values. The experience also provided an opportunity to strengthen my empathy, leadership and adult-teaching skills. As a senior student, I was blindly trusted by the IUBAT students. Their trust, their leadership, their willingness to learn, and their notion of moving forward as a team motivated me as a role model. Unexpectedly, this Bangladesh trip also assisted me to integrate my own immigrant experience in my interactions with the local students. In short, my Bangladesh learning experience helped me to really understand nursing and caring.”