Maurine Church Coburn School of Nursing—changing lives

Nursing student Cheyenne Orsini is visiting with her classmates in the student area at the Maurine Church Coburn School of Nursing (MCCSN) at Monterey Peninsula College; she’s sipping a cup of coffee, waiting for class to start. She is divorced, has two children, and works a part-time job. She doesn’t have much time for lounging. But she hopes that by working her way through nursing school, struggling through two years of juggling work, school, and family, she can change her life.

“I wanted something rewarding, something my kids could be proud of,” says Orsini, 29, who stayed home to raise her kids before going back to school.

Since its creation two decades ago, MCCSN, a Community Hospital affiliated school, has helped students like Orsini do just that: change their life. The school was established in 1982 with a grant from the Maurine Church Coburn Charitable Trust. In the late 1980s, the faculty decided to pursue national accreditation, a voluntary process awarded to nursing schools that have met rigorous criteria established by nursing experts throughout the nation. Faculty worked more than two years to meet these criteria, and in 1990 the school received initial accreditation from the National League for Nursing Accrediting Commission. This accreditation was reaffirmed in 1996 and 2004.

Since its inception, the school has graduated nearly 1,000 students. Of those, nearly 98 percent have gone on to pass the registered nurse licensure exam, allowing them to embark on exciting new professional lives, providing healthcare organizations around the Bay with a wealth of well-trained, professional nurses.

“The school is transformational for many of our students,” says Cheryl Jacobson, R.N., psychiatric/mental health instructor and assistant director of the program. “Many come in without marketable skills, they’re often single parents, and maybe they’re having difficulty meeting their financial responsibilities. With persistence and hard work, their lives will change dramatically after graduation.”

“I wanted something rewarding, something my kids could be proud of”

— Cheyenne Orsini

Typical student

The typical MCCSN student is a returning student in his or her early 30s. Often the student is switching careers; more than half have children, and many are single parents. Ninety percent of the nursing students financially need to work while going to school.

They’re incredibly motivated. “These are men and women who have had time to experience life, and who have made hard decisions to undergo the stresses that a career change involves for them and their families,” says Deb Schulte Hacker, R.N., director of the program for the past 18 years.

Students range from recent high school graduates to grandmothers. About 15 percent are male. Five times as many apply for entrance into the school as get in. They graduate with an Associate of Science degree and are eligible to be licensed as a registered nurse once they pass the state board exam.

“We get housewives, carpenters, insurance salespeople,” Hacker says. “They come from all walks of life. Because the average age is in the early 30s, they have some life experience. They think about nursing as a satisfying career change.”

There are students like 40-year-old Michelle Ramsey, a former flight attendant who quit work to stay home with her two children. Once her children entered school fulltime, she decided to go to nursing school to help supplement her husband’s income.

“It’s so expensive to live on the Peninsula,” Ramsey says. “There’s a lot of management involved in going back to school, but it will be well worth it.”

Collaboration

From its initial founding, MCCSN has been set up with a unique format that combines hands-on work experience in healthcare settings with a college education. Today’s nurses need both, Hacker says.

“Our model, I think, picks the best of both — education in the college setting while also having this strong tie to the real world of nursing. It’s really unique and so positive.”

The nursing school’s link to Community Hospital has been a true partnership. Operating costs are shared between the college and the hospital. And students get practical, hands-on nursing experience at Community Hospital and other healthcare organizations in the area.

The hospital has also been involved in other support capacities.

“Over the years, Community Hospital staff nurses have been involved in school issues such as curriculum development, hiring of faculty, and admission of students,” Hacker says.

The collaboration between the college and the hospital creates the type of well-rounded nurse who can enter the workforce upon graduation both well-educated and well-trained. And the current high demand for quality nursing care has created a welcoming job market for MCCSN grads.

“New graduate nurses are making nearly $72,000 within six months of graduation,” says Hacker. “They will always have jobs.”

“New graduate nurses are making nearly $72,000 within six months of graduation. They will always have jobs.”

— Deb Schulte Hacker, R.N., MCCSN director

Work/study

In addition to the hands-on experience provided through the R.N. program, MCCSN students also have the option of gaining even more work-related experience before graduation through a work/study program started in 1989.

Students have the opportunity to work in healthcare settings as a “nursing student worker” in addition to their regularly scheduled clinical experiences.

“It’s a program we pioneered in the state of California,” says Hacker. And it has been particularly successful at MCCSN because so many of the students need to work to put themselves through school.

“It’s optional,” Hacker says. “About half of the students take advantage of it. We know that most are going to work anyway. We’d rather have them spend their time reinforcing their nursing skills than working in a non-nursing job.”

They work in a variety of locations, but primarily at Community Hospital. And often these positions open doors to their first job opportunities upon graduation.

Scholarships

The Community Hospital Auxiliary awards as much as $75,000 to $100,000 a year in much-needed scholarships for nursing students in financial need. Most of the students benefit to some degree from these scholarships, which are underwritten by donations for this purpose.

Much of the success of the nursing school can be attributed to the collaboration between the hospital and the college, says Patti Nervino, R.N., a faculty member since 1986. That, and the hard work of its students.

“The students are incredible,” says Nervino. “They seem to be able to keep three balls up in the air at the same time. I marvel at it. It’s just a wonderful, collaborative place to work.”

Each year, Hacker says, she sees the results of this 20-year-long partnership between the school and the hospital when students come back to visit after being out in the community, working, making money, saving lives.

“The most satisfaction I have is seeing graduates come back a year later,” Hacker says. “They hold themselves differently and are so excited to be making such a difference in their own and others’ lives. It’s wonderful.”

Maurine Church Coburn and the art of giving

Maurine Church Coburn, the namesake of the Monterey Peninsula College school of nursing, gave millions of dollars to charitable causes during her lifetime and, through a trust set up in her name, after her death in 1977.

Her gifts helped build classrooms and other facilities at York School, All Saints’ Episcopal Day School, and other educational institutions. She gave thousands of dollars toward scholarships. At Community Hospital, her donations built the Fountain Court and created a special fund to pay for the care of indigent patients.

The trust ensures that the good works she performed in her lifetime continue after her death. It has provided more than 80 grants, totaling more than $2 million, to educational, medical, religious, cultural, and service organizations, primarily in the Monterey Peninsula area.

But the major portion of her trust was devoted to the 1982 creation of the Maurine Church Coburn School of Nursing, which was established with a grant to be administered by Community Hospital Foundation. “Her philanthropy and generosity were widespread,” says Thomas Tonkin, former president and CEO of Community Hospital for 35 years and a friend of Coburn’s.

A native of San Francisco, Coburn surprised her family when she moved to Honolulu as a young woman and established a career as an interior designer. Married and then widowed in the 1950s, she eventually moved back to California, where she met and married Samuel F.B. Morse, creator of the Pebble Beach Company. During the 17 years the two were married, they lived a high-society lifestyle while donating time and money to charitable institutions around the Monterey Bay. Morse donated the land for the hospital’s current location, and Coburn served several terms on the hospital’s board of trustees.

During those years, Coburn was particularly involved in the design of the hospital. Her imprint is still apparent in much of the hospital’s artwork.

“She was artistic, sensitive to art and décor, and a leading figure in the hospital’s art collection,” says Tonkin. She also established a fund to not only help pay for the art, but to provide live music at the hospital for patients; this weekly tradition continues today.

“Her long-term influence is still felt,” Tonkin says.