Mohammed Al-Abdulla

4/1/2013

                                                                 Kathy McCurry

            Today at Avila University, I had an interesting interview with Kathy McCurry. She is a nursing teacher at Avila University.  I asked her about her general background. She said that she had been a nurse for almost thirty years. She got her Nursing degree at Ohio State University in Columbus Ohio. She lived in Kansas City for two years and is teaching at Avila as her second academic year, working at the nursing skill lab.

            I next asked her about her future plans. It includes time here at Avila University. She was hired to be the coordinator for all the simulation and skills lab activities. Right now she teaches in the skill course where students learn how to do IV starts, putting catheters, feeding tubes and other things. She will also be expanding this course. She is also the coordinator for nursing simulation at Avila. What that means is that they have a lot of high fidelity mannequins in the nursing lab that have electronic capability. For example, instead of a plastic mannequin laying there for the students to practice on, they create fictitious patients. She actually has special mannequins that she can control by a laptop computer so that they can open their eyes, talk, and their chest rises when they breathe. And we read them a type of nursing report, and the students are expected to go identify the problems and take care of the patients. It is part of her role for the next few years to expand the simulation that they are doing in their program, because research shows that that is a good way for students to learn. This is in addition to the clinical time that they do in the hospital,

            The third thing I asked her was what was her future plan for her family. She said retirement and that she has two older children who are out of college. Also to enjoy the empty nest years and doing a lot of travelling, working on hitting all the National Parks. Often times they enjoy traveling and outdoors stuff during summer. This year, she hopes to visit San Francisco,. and other cities.

            Fourth I asked her what was her favorite hobby. She said that she likes to read and she likes to garden, and that was one of her plans for the day. To go to one of her favorite stops, which is Lowe’s. She has a lot of blackberries, grape vines, and tomatoes growing. They cook lots of organic during summer with whatever they have growing in the garden. So, she likes to garden, ski, bike, hike and do any outside activity.

            Finally I asked her what her favorite food was. She said pizza