In between countless hours of classes and assignments, and on top of all the stress and the heavy work load that comes with being a nursing major, members of the Student Nurses’ Association find time to do something else, helping people in need.
Perhaps it is a giving nature and desire to help others that made many students choose the profession of nursing. In order to pursue that goal, members of this organization take on many community service projects each year and still manage to continue their goal of becoming nurses.
Over the course of the school year, the Student Nurses’ Association does a number of different volunteer activities.
For Thanksgiving and Easter, they assemble food baskets that they donate to charity. They also collect toys and clothes and give them as Christmas gifts to children at Riverview Hospital in Middletown, Conn.
In addition, the members of this organization will participate in the KC 101 Breast Cancer Walk, and the Light the Night Walk.
This organization is also run on a statewide and nationwide level. However, according to the Association’s president here at Quinnipiac, Dana Cantiello, the group doesn’t have too many guidelines to follow.
“We can do pretty much any activity, within reason,” she said.
A national convention will be held in April, and Quinnipiac’s chapter of the organization will be represented.
Besides community and national activities, the Student Nurses’ Association also conducts a number of activities within the organization itself, on campus. Because nursing is such a stressful field with a heavy course load, the members of the organization have devised a “Buddy Program.”
This program partners seniors with juniors, juniors with sophomores, and sophomores with freshmen, so that older students can help younger students with issues they are dealing with in terms of the nursing program. They also hold an Annual Career Luncheon in April, where nurses come and talk to students about career opportunities in the field of nursing.
The Student Nurses’ Association meets once a month, because all of the students are very busy with school work. At the meetings, they discuss upcoming events and activities.
“It is basically an open forum where members can share their ideas about activities,” said Cantiello.
The organization’s next meeting will be held Oct. 14 at 1 p.m. in Buckman 129. All nursing students and others who are interested in switching majors to nursing are welcome to join.

For more information, contact President Dana Cantiello at Dana.Cantiello@quinnipiac. edu, contact faculty adviser Anne Durkin or go to the organization’s web site at www.geocities.com/qustudentnurses.