The Everett Community College campus was once vibrant with student club activity. Due to COVID-19, it’s now a ghost town with pre-pandemic flyers still taped to the public bulletin boards. Of the 30+ clubs and student organizations that thrived on the college grounds, less than 10 remain active. Of these survivors, one organization stands among them as an invaluable asset to a driven student body of academics: The Student Nursing Organization.

The Student Nursing Organization (SNO) provides resources and support for EvCC nursing students to efficiently move through their education, and aims to instill a deep-sense of community into the entirety of the nursing program; a field of work that by its very nature, revolves around helping their community members. “Healthcare is all about teamwork, so that’s part of the community we focus on,” says Kirsti Boyd, academic advisor for the Student Nursing Organization.

Before the pandemic hit in March 2020, the SNO’s value of community was reflected in the community-based fundraiser projects the students and faculty coordinated every quarter. This included a project called the Everett Foot Project, where nursing students volunteered to provide foot care at the Everett Gospel Mission Men’s Day Shelter for the homeless population.
The project included a fundraiser to provide socks for those in need, and led to referring some patients to medical professionals for further inspection. The Student Nursing Organization regularly promoted community service projects using the nursing skills they were taught, a tradition that halted at the impact of the COVID-19 crisis.

The EvCC nursing program trains 264 total students every quarter, and has retained full capacity for its admissions since the pandemic began in the early Spring of 2020. Amidst campus lockdowns, the nursing program has adjusted how they engage students in their academics. However, they’re required to adjust how they uphold their community values as well. Learning how to be a nurse means learning how to be a piece in the community as a whole, and SNO strives to solidify those community bonds within the nursing program.

Spencer Fidler, President of the Student Nursing Organization, outlined two goals for nurturing the Nursing Program during the pandemic: to effectively communicate to the student body the resources that SNO provides, and to improve overall involvement in the organization. “I ran for president because I believed in SNO’s mission of engaging students and providing resources,” Fidler said.

The Student Nursing Organization has survived in large part due to its integration into Everett Community College’s Nursing Program itself. Every new student that is accepted into the nursing program becomes a member of SNO, and is invited to connect with senior student organization officers who are there to help students through the rigorous program. Additionally, student liaisons attend nursing program faculty meetings to represent the student body and connect with the program administrators about student issues.

These student liaisons and other board members meet to discuss the information of faculty meetings, and disperse information to the rest of the Student Nursing Organization. This information can range from philanthropic fundraising ventures for the program, to job listings and internship resources, and becomes available to every student in the Nursing Program. “[SNO] really is a well-oiled machine,” says Jocelyn Flynn, Student Communications Director of SNO.

The Student Nursing Organization has partnered with faculty members of the EVCC Nursing Program and with the Red Cross to host a blood drive on Feb. 9th 2022 in an effort to reestablish their community ties after abiding lockdown regulations for so long. “To give back to this community where they went to school and where they are living and working is really important,” says Kirsti Boyd.

This event marks the first event the SNO has conducted since the lockdown, and represents the community service that SNO encourages nursing students to participate in. Boyd came to tears when reflecting on SNO, saying “the resiliency of these students, the fact that there are plenty that still want to come into the nursing program, it really makes me feel really hopeful about the future.”