College of Nursing Launches DAISY Award for Extraordinary Faculty

The USF College of Nursing took a defining step toward recognizing and celebrating the compassionate work of nursing educators this week by officially launching the DAISY Award for Extraordinary Faculty program.

The new program, in conjunction with the DAISY Foundation, seeks to honor a nursing faculty member’s valuable contributions in an ongoing and meaningful way.

The DAISY Foundation is best known for creating the DAISY Award for Extraordinary Nurses, a recognition program at more than 4,500 academic and health care facilities that thanks nurses for making a difference in their patients’ lives.

At USF, the nursing faculty recognition program has been in the works since last year.

Under the new program, nursing faculty members will be nominated quarterly by students and alumni. During each fall and spring semester, one of the nominated faculty will be selected from the past year’s nominations and will receive The DAISY Award for Extraordinary Nurse Faculty.

The award is a tangible way to combat nursing faculty burn out, according to Susan Perry, Vice Dean of Faculty and Community Affairs at the College of Nursing.

Dr. Perry noted that compassion fatigue affects nurses when they have repeated exposure to others’ suffering and over time, their ability to be empathetic decreases.

She likened the secondary traumatic stress disorder to continually emptying a glass of water without refilling it with more water.

Faculty members can also have compassion fatigue, and the award is aimed at highlighting faculty who have really made a difference in a student’s life.

“The idea is having our students and alumni let us know how our faculty is impacting their lives to fill their glass,” she said.

In May 2019, DAISY Foundation leaders Mark and Bonnie Barnes visited the college and gave an emotional presentation describing why they started the foundation and the need for meaningful recognition in nursing education and practice.

Bonnie Barnes with the DAISY Foundation visited the USF College of Nursing in May 2019.

The couple started the nonprofit 20 years ago as a way to praise nurses after the death of their 33-year-old son Patrick, who had an autoimmune disease. The pair were compelled to find a way to give credit to nurses for how they treated Patrick and for what nurses do every day for patients and families.

In 2010, the foundation expanded the nurse recognition program to nursing schools by creating the faculty-specific award. There are at least 230 schools of nursing that thank educators with this award.

In July, the foundation, in partnership with the American Association of Colleges of Nursing, the National League for Nursing, and the Organization of Associate Degree Nurses issued a call to action for schools of nursing to “recognize and celebrate their nursing faculty as role models in compassionate nursing practice.”

To nominate an extraordinary nurse faculty, College of Nursing students and alumni can visit bit.ly/daisyaward2020.

Story by Elizabeth L. Brown, USF College of Nursing