The Pelican News - June 2017

Page 12 • Pelican News June, July, August 2017
Meet The Latest Recipients of the
Joe Ann Clark Graduate Nursing Education Award!
Cynthia Prestholdt, RN, PhD.
Chair, LNF Scholarship and Awards Committee
Anna Caroline
Edwards Burge
Kathleen McFarlain
The Joe Ann Clark Graduate
Nursing Education Award was
initiated in 2012 by the Louisiana
State Nurses Association
(LSNA). This award is made
annually, funds permitting, on a
competitive basis to a Louisiana
professional nurse enrolled in
an accredited graduate nursing
program with a focus on Nursing
Education. The goal is to
provide financial assistance to
a Louisiana Registered Nurse
pursuing graduate education for
preparation as a nurse educator
in an academic environment.
The award is named in honor
of Dr. Joe Ann Clark, a retired
LSNA Executive Director, for
her significant contributions to
nursing leadership and education.
There have been five previous
recipients of this award. Financial
arrangements for the award are
managed through the Louisiana
Nurses Foundation (LNF). The award for Spring, 2017 was
$1,000 for academic expenses for each recipient. The call for
applications was publicized in September, with a submission
deadline of November 07, 2016. The LNF Scholarship &
Awards Committee members completed their objective
evaluation of the applicants and selected two recipients
with the top scores. Application was made on December 1st
to the American Nurses Foundation (ANF) for matching
funds. LSNA & LNF were notified in mid-December that
our matching-fund application was approved for these two
students. The ANF Scholarship funds are supported through
Fresenius Kabi, who make these scholarships available
from the proceeds of the American Nurse movie. The
recipients of this year’s Joe Ann Clark Graduate Nursing
Education Award are Anna Caroline Edwards Burge
and Kathleen McFarlain.
Anna Caroline Edwards Burge is an RN from
Hammond, Louisiana. She is a member of ANA and
the Emergency Nurses Association and is a certified
Emergency Nurse. She began graduate enrollment in 2016
in the MSN program in Nursing Education at LSU Health
New Orleans, School of Nursing. Ms. Burge is currently
employed as a charge nurse and unit director at Our Lake
of the Lake Regional Medical Center in Baton Rouge, LA.
Her role is to implement training, evaluate patient care
guidelines and needs for improvement, and to educate and
demonstrate health care standards and regulations. She’s
also served as a preceptor for newly hired RN’s and has
taught new ER nurses strategies in dealing with mental
health patients in the Emergency Room. She serves on the
Clinical Education Committee and is a Level 3 Clinical
Advancement Program participant – a clinical ladder at
her hospital. Her career trajectory has taken her from a
Nurse Technician to an RN to an RN Unit Manager and
now a graduate nursing student. As an undergraduate
nursing student, Anna Burge was active in the Student
Nurses Association, and was on the President’s and Dean’s
lists of her university. She stated, “My dream education
job is to be a nursing instructor.” Her graduate program
director stated she “leads by example in the role of charge
nurse... she has volunteered to lead several activist projects
for the school of nursing... she is committed to lifelong
learning and wishes to go on to obtain her PhD. She is a
natural educator and is skilled in conveying her messages
easily to others.”
Kathleen McFarlain is an RN from Lake Charles,
Louisiana. She is a member of Sigma Theta Tau International
Honor Society of Nursing. She began continuous graduate
school enrollment in Fall 2014 in the MSN program as a
Nurse Educator in the College of Nursing at McNeese State
University in Lake Charles, LA. Ms. McFarlain is employed
as Assistant Director of Nursing/Administrator of Pedia Trust-
Lake Charles (a pediatric day health center). In addition to
precepting students enrolled in a medical assistant program,
she’s been an adjunct faculty since 2013 for pediatric clinical
rotations for both BSN and ASN programs. Earlier, she was
an office manager/nurse supervisor at Children’s Clinic of
Southwest Louisiana – Kidmed Office. She has been an
Emergency Room Staff nurse and has also been active in her
church and in community events for Down Syndrome, Cystic
Fibrosis and the March of Dimes. She participated in her
school of nursing’s accreditation site visit for CCNE continued
accreditation. Ms. McFarlain received McNeese’s Anita Fields
Leadership Award (2009) and received her undergraduate
degree with honors from her school’s Honors College. She
is the single parent of a child she fostered as an infant and
adopted on his first birthday. She aspires to teach full-time
at the university level. A seasoned nursing professor who has
known her for 10 years stated, “Kathleen ranks in the top 1%
of nurse educator students I have taught . . .she IS an awesome
nurse and educator.”
In addition to meeting application requirements, these
two excellent graduate nursing students have demonstrated
leadership and potential for success as nurse educators and
for contributions to the profession of Nursing. Congratulations
to both recipients as they complete their graduate nursing
education programs in the near future.
The author expresses gratitude to the diligent members
of the LNF Scholarship & Awards Committee: Jennifer
Barrow, Dr. Catherine Cormier, Dr. Carol Gordon, Maxine
Johnson, Dr. Barbara Moffett, and Dr. Valerie Schluter.