JACKSON ā A stellar career for Becky Tustain teaching aspiring nurses in ŠĀ²ŹĶųā Associate Degree Nursing program began with just a small request of her husband.
āWhen I came here in 1975, I asked my family for two years to go to school,ā she said. āI didnāt think I could ask my family to give me but two years. Iāve gone on to a lot since then, but [tweetable alt=””]in my heart, Iām an associate degree nurse.ā[/tweetable]
A decade out of Central High School in Jackson and already a mother of one of her three children, Tustain grabbed ahold of an education in nursing that morphed quickly into a profession. She earned her ADN credential from ŠĀ²ŹĶų in 1977, then moved on to William Carey College for her bachelorās five years later, all the while working as an instructor in ŠĀ²ŹĶųā program and a staff nurse at Mercy Regional Medical Center in Vicksburg, where she settled and still resides.
She completed her masterās in Nursing Education from the University of Mississippi in 1986. She retired from ŠĀ²ŹĶų in 1995 to pursue a Nurse Practitionerās credential, which she earned from Mississippi University for Women in 1998.
Such a quick turnaround from learning to teaching in the program meant she was with ladies she still calls the āiconsā of the nursing program, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year.
āEunice Pace was our first dean at NAHC, then it was Bobbie Anderson,ā she said. āWe had Mildred Hearn, Dixie Keyes, Kay Stubblefield Jones, Linda Hughes, Sherry Avenmarg, Patty Baker.
āI knew I had a good core,ā she said. āMy mother had a stroke and my father had a heart attack during the few weeks between graduation and boards, so I didnāt get to study. I walked into boards, and passed them. That was because of that faculty.ā
Tustainās timeline teaching in the collegeās nursing program runs closely with that of the Nursing/Allied Health Center itself, into which the program moved in 1982 from smaller venues on the Raymond Campus.
āWhen I started teaching, I volunteered to come in before my contract began because I wanted to start out doing it right,ā she said. āBack then, the program was all done in this little-bitty room in the science building. But, we were much more functional than when it was in the old house and it had supplies. And we had some great faculty teaching me.ā
There was no down time between the move to the new facilities and the teaching schedule.
āDr. Muse said we will teach on that Friday and Monday, and weād just move over the weekend,ā Tustain said. āThe moving company moved the heavy conference tables and other equipment, but they didnāt know how to set it up. It took about 20 of us women faculty, but we got the beds in and set them up. We moved Friday afternoon, we worked all day Saturday and Sunday, and we all taught Monday. Now, is that not teamwork?ā
Moving into it might have been a group project, but her mark on the learning lab remains, down to the positioning of electrical outlets and mirrors above the beds so students could see what theyāre doing ā commonplace now, but unique among nursing programs at the time.
āThe learning lab is my baby,ā Tustain said. āI designed it to where student and instructor could see what they were doing, with the mirrors overhead.ā
In 1985, Tustain, Anderson and ADN instructors in a handful of neighboring states organized what is today the Organization for Associate Degree Nursing. Anderson was its first president.
āThe group was formed in order to protect AD nursing as an entry-level program for registered nursing as a whole,ā Tustain said.
āIt allowed people who couldnāt give four years of a financial contribution outside of work to do it.ā
The ADN programās brand is strong in Mississippi and in medical circles because of its tradition of quality instruction, she said.
āWe were one of the larger and productive programs, and our pass rates were good, so everybody wanted ŠĀ²ŹĶų nurses,ā she said. āItās because we did direct care. The faculty went with the student and did direct care. We didnāt just send them out to observe. It was hands-on learning.ā