Policy advocacy
My policy advocacy involved enhancing health services throughout the education system by advocating for more nurses in both primary and secondary schools in the State. With respect to proposing legislation of the policy, I visited Congresswoman Alexandria Cortez, who is an elected official representing individual from the 14th district, New York. As a member of the Democratic Party, this makes her the best fit for the advocacy of this legislation. I spoke to the official about the policy to acquire her response on its effectiveness and feasibility. Due to the rapid population growth in the United States, most of the schools are filled while there are only a few nurses and consultants. Nurses working within the learning facilities are therefore overwhelmed with tasks leading to job-related fatigue as they are required to attend to hundreds of students daily. In this case, the general quality of the healthcare services that nurses provide to students is low, thus demonstrating the need to implement legislation that supports increasing the number of nurses in learning institutions. After introducing the issue, the official was honest to indicate that she was not familiar with the legislation even though she was aware of the nursing shortage in learning institutions and asked for a more detailed outline. During the meeting, I conveyed the issue of nurse’s shortage in learning institutions by providing an in-depth background of the matter, including statistics and facts to demonstrate the need for the policy.
Healthier students learn better and educated people grow to support healthier families leading to a stronger and highly productive nation for generations to come. School nurses usually strive to ensure that all children gain access to limitless educational opportunities irrespective of their health. In the coordination of children’s healthcare major challenges relating to human resources exist, thus hindering the ability to create a healthy care system for learners. Education and health are entangled because they work together to benefit communities and the nation at large. Health is indistinguishably tied to the readiness of students to learn while education is one of the leading social basis of health because it forecasts an individual’s future success. School nurses, therefore, stand at the joint between education and health weaving the needed support to reduce learning barriers while promoting healthy growth among learners, families, and all involved communities. However, despite the fundamental, integral role that school nurses play in promoting higher academic performance by offering the needed healthcare services, there is an increasing nurse to students ration.
Nurses, similar to other employees, deserve a favorable working environment that accounts for their needs all the time. Overburdening them creates work-related hazards due to fatigue, which adversely affect their abilities to deliver quality services as set by the existing healthcare standards. Every person normally experiences fatigue infrequently because it is the body’s strategy of asking for sleep and rest. However, due to the shortage of nurses in learning institutions when compared to the number of learners that require the respective health services, nursing fatigue is persistent. When the feeling is persistent, this, therefore, demonstrates that something is missing. Based on a recent survey conducted among school nurses in Texas, 38 percent of all the respondents indicated that they had committed medical errors related to fatigue that might have had a negative effect of the safety of patients. Nurses should not be overwhelmed with tasks since exhaustion impairs typically their capability to provide empathetic, safe, competent, and reliable care to the patients. As the population of students continues to grow in both primary and secondary schools, so should be the number of nurses in general. Emotional exhaustion and the inability to think critically among school nurses continue to affect health promotion, and there is a need to address the issue to protect current and coming generations.
With reference to these facts, I believe that the policy is both relevant and feasible, given that it focuses on enhancing healthcare services quality in learning institutions. Improving quality, increasing accessibility, and convenience of the services will help in reducing safety-related risks. The government usually spends millions annually to deal with health defects that would have been avoided through adherence to safety standards. Nurses will also benefit since their working morale will increase, leading to better performance in a setting where nursing fatigue is not accommodated. About 52 percent of students seeking medical assistance are sent to nearby hospitals to acquire the services because nurses lack the mechanisms to attend to them. In this case, the implementation of the policy will lower the number of persons seeking for the services from hospitals and allowing nurses to get adequate time to effectively address the needs of every person and improve on patient outcomes such as safety, engagement, and satisfaction. It is my plea that you support and help in ensuring the successful implementation of the policy to help students, nurses, and the community at large. By improving the health stability of our children, the community is assured of a promising future full of both social and economic successes.
Elected Official’s Response
The elected official noted that the proposal was not only beneficial but one that addresses a significant issue affecting the education and healthcare sector. She noted that the process of implementing the policy would not be straight based on the necessity to demonstrate its value, feasibility, and cost efficiency. In this case, she noted that adding more nurses would mean that the cost of labor would increase as well, but that does not imply that the implementation is not necessary. The official, therefore, assured me of her support to ensure the success of the policy. She also added that for it to be successful, it means that we will need to acquire data from different learning institutions that are affected the most notably those with a growing students population. The approach would, therefore, help in gathering more reliable information and laying out a credible plan on the implementation of the policy.
Based on the limited time we had during the meeting, I was required to send additional information about the policy. The scope of the policy, including its objectives, needed resources, and duration, was required by the official for her to convey the plan to those involved. At the ending of the meeting, I promised to send soft copies of the documents through email for review and adjustments if needed. With regard to the elected official’s demeanor, she was cordial and friendly to talk to. I was very nervous and anxious about the meeting, but she appeared agreeable discussing as she would often contribute by making suggestions, ask questions, and take note. In other others, she was very interested in the subject, which further encouraged me to offer more details.