Your nursing degree from Cedar Crest College gives you the foundation to pursue an advanced degree and specialize in a number of areas, including specialization as a nurse practitioner, nurse anesthetist, nurse midwife and other paths. Nurses also enter the fields of quality assurance, communications, product management and marketing/sales.

Employment opportunities for an RN are many and varied. A bachelor’s degree is preferred, if not required, for most of them, and some require a graduate degree.

Staff nursing— For a hospital, physician office, rehab center, hospice or psychiatric facility. Specialties include medical/surgical, labor and delivery, pediatrics, emergency, operating room and critical care.

Community nursing— For a public health department or agency, hospital outpatient department, home health service, day care center and mental health center.

Long-term care nursing— For a rehab center, nursing home, retirement facility and residential day care.

Government nursing— For the armed services, Veterans Administration, Indian Health Service and Peace Corps/VISTA.

Nursing education— For a teaching hospital, wellness center, vocational program, or for a college or university (with an advanced nursing degree).

Nursing research— For a teaching hospital or national organization, or for a college or university (with an advanced degree).

International nursing— For a military base, government agency, private organization, international business, and church-related mission service.

Nursing Honor Society

Sigma Theta Tau International, also known as Sigma, is an international honor society of nursing committed to fostering excellence, scholarship, and leadership in nursing to improve health care worldwide. The purposes of the nursing honor society are to recognize superior achievement and leadership qualities, to foster high professional standards, to encourage creative work, and to strengthen commitment to the ideas and purposes of the nursing profession among nursing students.

Cedar Crest College School of Nursing is represented by the Theta Rho Chapter of Sigma. The Theta Rho chapter was officially chartered in 1978 to recognize nursing students for their achievements, leadership, and commitment to the nursing profession. The Chapter also encourages future leaders and provides a social forum for nursing students.

Membership in Theta Rho is awarded to bachelor’s, master’s and doctoral nursing students who meet defined criteria and demonstrate excellence in scholarship. Community nurse leaders who have made outstanding contributions to nursing can also be invited to join.

You can read more about the Theta Rho Chapter on its website hosted by Sigma Membership.

For more information please contact:

Asher Atwood, President

Mae Ann Pasquale, Faculty Counselor

Student Nurses Association

Faculty Advisors
Roxann Wagner MSN, RN ()
Sandra Axt MSN, RN, CCRN ()

The Student Nurses Association (SNA) is open to all students majoring in nursing. The SNA is a very important part of the nursing program by keeping students aware of changing trends in nursing and by increasing student awareness of the various aspects of nursing. Students are considered an active member of SNA as long as they attend half of all the meetings and half of all events. Students may participate in any of the three major committees within the SNA: fund-raising, community and social. In the past, members of SNA have organized clothing drives, held Easter egg hunts, participated in blood drives, sponsored guest speakers and assumed Board positions in the Student Nurses Association of PA. General business meetings are held monthly. Fund-raisers, community activities and social events are held throughout the semester.

An acronym for Diseases Attacking the Immune System, The DAISY Foundation was established in 1999 in memory of J. Patrick Barnes who died (at the age of 33) from complications of the auto-immune disease Idiopathic Thrombocytopenic Purpura (ITP). Patrick’s family was very touched by the remarkable compassion and clinical skill demonstrated by Patrick’s nurses during his illness, so they created DAISY to recognize exceptional nurses everywhere. The DAISY Foundation is dedicated to saying Thank You to Nurses and is proud to recognize Nursing Faculty for the inspirational influence they have on their nursing students.

Learn more about The DAISY Award for Extraordinary Nurses at DAISYfoundation.org.

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Daisy Award Nomination

Global nursing is an eye-opening experience that helps you appreciate cultural differences, explore other kinds of health care systems, and see how your own beliefs and values impact your caregiving. Cedar Crest offers many global nursing opportunities. You can spend a few weeks in rural Belize caring for village residents, study at partner nursing schools in Sweden or Tanzania, and get to know international students on the Cedar Crest campus. A global perspective is important for nurses in our multicultural society, and it’s also considered a strong component of leadership.

Nursing Opportunities

As part of an elective course on global nursing, eight Cedar Crest students spent two weeks in rural Belize. Along with two nursing instructors and a medical student, they went door-to-door, meeting with village residents and inviting those who needed care to come to makeshift clinics. There, they checked for vital signs, screened blood pressure and glucose levels, and provided medications for illnesses which in many cases had gone untreated for a long time.

“You can’t save the world—or even a small village,” said participant Samantha Barbato ’11. “The biggest lesson I learned is how much these people accomplish on a daily basis with so little.”

Ongoing Partnerships

Cedar Crest nursing students have opportunities to study in very different settings.

“Students experience how health care can be taken for granted in the US. When the only diagnostic tools we have in the field are our eyes, ears, hands, nose, a stethoscope, and maybe a glucometer, you assume a different approach to healthcare,” says Wendy Robb, Dean of Nursing.

“What can we do that won’t cost money or use resources that we don’t have? The people are SO grateful for the very little we can do. Sometimes just their knowing that they are worth our time traveling to their remote village, makes it all worth it. They know someone cares. It really opens your eyes and helps you to appreciate all that you/we have. Many travelers will tell you that it changed their whole perspective and that is what drives many to come back again.”