THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: WEDNESDAY, June 15, 1994 TAG: 9406140136
SECTION: ISLE OF WIGHT CITIZEN PAGE: 08 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LINDA McNATT, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: 940615 LENGTH: SMITHFIELD
So Day, like so many young people in northern Isle of Wight County with no college plans, went to work at a local packing plant. But bagging hams just wasn't her idea of a career, Day said.
{REST} Then she got a job cleaning rooms at a hotel in Williamsburg. She didn't like that either.
``I did almost nothing for a while,'' she said. ``I just worked around, at this job and that job.''
Finally, Day said, she started listening to her mother, a geriatric nurse's aide at a local adult home.
``My mother was always talking about how much she enjoyed being around the older people, how much you could learn from them just by listening,'' Day said. ``She never went back to school until all of us were grown. Then she got her job at the nursing home, and she's always really liked what she does.''
So Day decided that maybe she should listen to the older folks, too, especially to her mother. She was convinced that she should sign up for a course in geriatric nursing at Paul D. Camp Community College, the same course her mother had taken a few years ago.
Last August, Day got a grant to enter the Camp nursing program. On May 13, she graduated with a ``B'' average.
It wasn't easy, she said. The course was held at the Camp campus in Franklin. On some days, she attended class from 11 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Other days, she had night classes, from 6:30 to 9. She also had to participate in on-the-job training at the East Pavilion, a home for the aged at Southampton Memorial Hospital.
During training, Day said she took classes in everything from English to gerontology. The most difficult course for her was the computer class.
And the course she got the most personal benefit from, she said, was a fitness class she took for extra credit.
``I feel better,'' she said. ``I knew I could stand to lose a few pounds and I knew if I got a job when I got out, there may be some lifting involved. I hoped it would make me stronger, and I think it did.''
Day said she saw the benefit of her academic and attendance efforts before she even graduated. She applied at the Isle of Wight Health Department.
She was told there that she couldn't begin working until she got her certificate. She didn't know how quickly, however, she would hear from the health department.
``They called me on May 10, three days before I graduated,'' she said, smiling. ``They told me to come on in the following Monday.''
Day is employed in the department's personal care aide program. She has two elderly charges who both live alone. One is 83, the other 74.
Day said she gets to one house about 8:30 a.m., helps the woman bathe, cooks breakfast, does some light house cleaning, makes sure the woman is doing all right from a health standpoint and moves on to her next assignment, where she does the same thing.
``I like just having two people to take care of,'' she said. ``I think I can get to know them better. They're really nice.''
She goes back later in the day to check on the first patient and returns to her second patient before she goes home.
Everything she does in her new job, she was trained for in the course she took at Camp - everything, that is, except cooking.
``I learned that from my mother, too,'' she said, shaking her head and laughing. ``I guess I'm glad I listened to her.''
Now, Day, 20, said she would like to eventually get her degree as a licensed practical nurse and then become a registered nurse.
``It makes me feel good,'' she said. ``I know I'm helping people. I just feel great, the satisfaction I'm getting out of it.''
by CNB