NURSING IN THE LIMELIGHT
Ryan Clark directs SU Theatre
student Maddie Howard ’22 and
Chris Roberts, retired coordinator
of Stevenson’s Theatre and Media
Performance program, during a
rehearsal of Finding Florence.
Nursing in the Limelight
Two Unlikely Majors Collaborate to Portray the
History and Drama of Nursing BY EMILY ROSENTHAL ’16
Oftentimes, the extraordinary academic and co- Wars, and even to today’s various nursing units.
curricular experiences that shape the lives and aspi- Stevenson student actors gathered information,
rations of Stevenson students are achieved through researched, and interviewed nurses for real-life
collaboration. The collaboration that has grown be- accounts and histories.
tween Stevenson’s Nursing and Theatre and Media “Our students were on the ground with this,”
Performance programs exemplifies the power of this Clark said, adding that he and Laura Holland,
approach. Together, faculty and students this spring Assistant to the Dean of the School of Humanities
created something for stage that had never been and Social Sciences, who served as dramaturge,
done before—the history and drama of nursing. created the narrative from there. “We served as
Beginning in fall 2017, SU Theatre students
editors, collaging together all this material.”
portrayed patients and families in end-of-life care Student Scarlet Dare ’20 chose to research
simulations to help train Nursing students. From nurses during the HIV/AIDS crisis. The production
those beginnings, Ryan Clark, M.F.A., Program had special meaning for Dare, who is majoring in
Coordinator and Assistant Professor of Theatre, and Nursing with a minor in Theatre.
Laurel Moody, RN, Assistant Professor of Nursing,
began a collaboration on a larger project.
Clark created Finding Florence, a play that took the
“I didn’t think that the two worlds would
collide,” she said. “Last spring, when the show was
announced, my jaw dropped.”
audience through the history of nursing from the Dare played multiple roles, including a nurse
time of Florence Nightingale, through the World caring for HIV/AIDS patients, a World War II cadet
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