Windsor member receives national nursing
award
 Windsor
NEA member Ruth Wisdom received national recognition from
the National Association of School Nurses for her dedication
to her profession and contributions to Missouri nursing achievements.
Wisdom, a registered nurse in the Windsor School District
is the National School Nurse Administrator of the Year. This
award acknowledges excellence in the administration of quality
school nursing services and health programs. Wisdom is the
director of health services in the Windsor School District,
located in Imperial, which is south of St. Louis. She supervises
five nurses, who oversee a student population of 3,000, plus
200 staff members.
As Wisdom climbed each rung on the nursing ladder, starting
out as a student nurse, working her way up to school nurse,
industrial nurse, and pediatric office nurse, she finally
reached the top rung by becoming the director of health services,
a position she has held for the past 33 years.
Wisdom has been the driving force behind many of Missouri’s
nursing achievements, including: lobbying for passage of the
Education of the Handicapped Act, lobbying for passage of
House Bill 564, which provides funding for school districts
to expand children’s health services, and implementing
nursing coverage for the alternative-school sites at the middle-
and high-school levels. Because of her “pro-active,
can-do attitude” and her solid foundation of nursing
expertise, Wisdom has become a model director of health services.
During her outstanding career, Wisdom has been awarded with
three coveted accolades: 1986 School Nurse of the Year by
the Jefferson County Association of School Nurses, 1988 School
Nurse of the Year, and 2004 School Nurse Administrator of
the Year, both by the Missouri Association of School Nurses.
Recognition and awards are nothing new to Wisdom, as she has
also received the 2004 Community Leadership Award by the Windsor
School District and 1998 Education Support Professional of
the Year award by Jefferson County.
Salute to school nurses
National School Nurse Day was established in 1977, May 10th
this year, to foster a better understanding of the role of
school nurses in the educational setting. Today, school nursing
is recognized as a specialized practice that advances the
well-being, academic success, and life-long achievement of
students. To this end, school nurses promote health and safety;
intervene with actual and potential health problems; provide
case-management services; and actively collaborate with others
to build student/family capacity for adaptation, self management,
self advocacy, and learning. They provide these services to
increasingly large numbers of students, often at more than
one school building.
A celebration of how much school nurses do to keep students
healthy and ready to learn is a key component of National
School Nurse Day celebrations.
School nurses have played a vital role in improving the health
and well-being of our nation’s children.
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