Student SN Awards winner

SAPHNA are proud to announce the winner of our inaugural student School Nurse poster awards. We had a fantastic field of entries covering a range of current issues that are facing children and young people today. The standards from our school nurse leaders of the future were high. The winning poster and all of the other poster entries will be available to view at our annual virtual conference on the 12^th September. More information and booking details can be found at Looking to a positive future: strengthen, prevent, promote and protect (vfairs.com)

Our overall poster presentation winner is student school nurse, Rachel Donnelly who is studying at Manchester Metropolitan. The title of her poster is ‘Supporting the health needs of LGBTQ+ Young People’.

We asked Rachel to tell us a bit about herself, why she chooses school nursing and how she see’s her career developing in the future

Why did you want to become a school nurse?

I wanted to become a school nurse because I wanted a career where I felt I was making a difference and helping to improve health outcomes for children, young people and their families. I also wanted a role where I could implement early support, provide advice and effect change in order to improve the lives of children and young people, not just during childhood but into adulthood too.

What do you enjoy about your role?

I love everything about school nursing and feel so lucky that I get to do this job every day. The role is so varied and no two days are the same! My absolute favourite part of the job is the school nurse drop-in clinics. I love the contact with the children and young people and really like that you never know what will come into your drop in, you have to be prepared for every eventuality, it really keeps you on your toes!

Where and how do you see yourself developing in the future?

Future career ambitions, to start with I want to just be the best school nurse I can be. Hopefully making a difference to the lives of the children and young people on my caseload. My areas of interest are anything related to health promotion, lgbtq+ and reducing health inequalities and I’m passionate about improving health outcomes for all. One of the main reasons I chose supporting lgbtq+ young people was because I wanted to improve health outcomes and reduce health inequalities.