Introducing
The DAISY Faculty Award

In collaboration with

Teaching nursing is increasingly challenging as teachers’ roles and responsibilities have increased in recent years. In addition to teaching, they are required to maintain their own clinical expertise and often practice nursing in clinical settings, caring for the most ill of patients.

Despite the many pressures on teachers, they have a profound impact on the future practice patterns of their students. Many students talk about hearing an instructor’s voice in the back of their heads even years after they have graduated. However, these dedicated teachers often do not receive appropriate recognition for the effect they have, in the long-run, on their students, on patient care, and on the professionalism of nursing.

Therefore, The DAISY Foundation, as part of its service to the nursing profession’s role in patient care, is establishing The DAISY Faculty Award. The purpose of this program is to provide a national recognition program that colleges/schools of nursing may use to demonstrate appreciation to teachers for their commitment and inspirational influence on their students. The Foundation hopes that, in some way, this program will contribute to a positive work environment and encourage them to continue teaching.

The Program

Modeled after The DAISY Award for Extraordinary Nurses, this program is designed to be flexible to fit each institution's culture and needs, yet turn-key, so there is little work for participating schools to do. Here's how it works:

Recipients of this Award are nurses whose expertise and excellence are demonstrated in their role as teachers of students studying nursing in nursing colleges/schools.

Honorees will be nominated by their students, peers, school administrators, and clinical staff in the hospitals where faculty have students.
Nomination forms and other materials will be provided to all participating institutions. These may be customized for each facility.
Specific Criteria will be defined by each participating nursing school to ensure that the program fits the school’s culture.

We suggest they include:

Excellence in Teaching: Classroom and Clinical
Demonstrates care and compassion with students, as the faculty facilitates learning in the classroom and clinical environment.
Provides an environment where students can freely express opinions and ideas in a respectful manner.
Is fair and unbiased in his/her treatment of individual students.
Displays a personal interest in student learning.
Collaborates effectively with the healthcare team to facilitate student learning in the patient care environment.

We also suggest that a specific example of how a faculty member delivers on these criteria be included in the nomination. The reading of these stories at the Award presentation will be compelling and touching.

Implementation

Implementation will be handled by each school of nursing.

To make the program as simple as we can, The DAISY Foundation will provide a template nomination form into which you may place your school's criteria, logo, etc.
We suggest honorees be selected in a blinded review of nominations submitted to a committee assigned to this task. (For example, in colleges with a Professional Development Committee, selection could be a role of the committee or it could be a separate task force with responsibility for the selection.) Committee members might include individuals from the nursing faculty, faculty from another area such as general education, and perhaps a student, an administrator, or even college staff.
Please designate acoordinator at each college as DAISY's key contact who will manage the award and assure the process.
Frequency of the presentation (e.g. one award per year, one award per semester, etc.) is be decided by each school's implementation team.
- In our pilot program conducted last year, the presentation was made at graduation. (Depicted here is Tamara Cooper, the first DAISY Faculty Award recipient in Cincinnati.)

Award Gifts

The DAISY Foundation will provide the following for each DAISY Faculty Nurse:

A certificate reading To honor your exceptional impact on your students and your inspirational influence on their future. The certificate will be signed by the Dean of each school and by DAISY Co-founder Mark Barnes. (A template for your certificate will be created for you, and you will be provided with beautiful green "leather" portfolios in which to present the Award.)
A DAISY Faculty Award pin
A hand-carved Shona sculpture entitled "A Healer's Touch." These serpentine stone sculptures are hand-carved for us by artists of the Shona Tribe in Zimbabwe. The sculptures are especially meaningful because of the profound respect the Shona people pay their traditional healers. Shona healers are affectionately regarded as treasures by those they care for, and the well-being and safety of the healer is of community-wide importance.

DAISY's purchase of these sculptures has become very important to the people who carve these beautiful pieces. Given the desperate political situation in Zimbabwe, there are no tourists to buy their work. So the money we pay for the sculptures is a tremendous help to the artists and hundreds of people in their extended families. Clearly, the incredible work being done by nurses here in the U.S. is reaching around the world to help save the lives of these gifted artists. The artists, in turn, are creating these very sensitive depictions of the unique relationship nurses have with their patients. Click Here to see a video of Shona artists carving Healer's Touch sculptures for DAISY.

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