Community College urges more men to pursue nursing careers

The Barbados Community College is stepping up efforts to address a stark gender imbalance in its nursing programme, with college leadership highlighting the urgent need for more male nurses to meet growing demand in healthcare.

Speaking at the fifth annual Ramona Mascoll Memorial Scholarship Award ceremony at the BCC conference room, funded by CIBC Caribbean on International Nurses Day, registrar Roger Worrell acknowledged that the number of male applicants continues to be “relatively very small”. The scholarship is named for Ramona Mascoll, the first nurse to lose her life during the COVID-19 pandemic.

He revealed a significant disparity between male and female students in the college’s nursing programme.

“In some groups of nurses of 30, you may only have about two males… we would love to encourage more male nurses to get into the programme…. Generally speaking, nursing is seen as a female profession. I think we have to admit that,” he said. “We get a large number of persons who apply – we get over 300 persons applying to the college – but out of that, you will find sometimes maybe ten males.”

Worrell suggested that more targeted outreach efforts may be needed to attract young men to the field.

“Maybe we have to go into the schools and speak more to the male students, and we do that sometimes, we go into the schools, but it all depends on whether males see nursing as an attractive profession, and that is a challenge. Maybe this is a plug for increased salaries for nurses that may encourage more males.”

BCC principal Annette Alleyne hinted at broader efforts to reform and balance gender representation across programmes. She pointed out that some departments at the college have a high male enrolment but are lacking in female participation.

“In the Division of Technology, for instance – computer studies as well – we have a higher enrolment of male students, so maybe what is happening there is something that could be emulated by the others. For instance, in our photovoltaic programme, I think there were just two female students out of a group of 70.”

She continued: “Gender imbalance is something that tertiary education institutions as a whole are going to have to figure out innovative strategies in order to recruit to where we have those disparities.”

CIBC Caribbean country manager Kemar Pollius expressed excitement that this year, for the first time in the scholarship’s five-year history, there are two male recipients.

“With all that is going on in our society among our young men, I am really pleased that this year we have two male student nurses, especially as I’ve been told that there is a real need for more male nurses in our system.”

Third-year student Ayrton White, who wants to specialise in mental health, recalled spending a lot of time as a patient at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital due to severe asthma. Even while ill, he wished he could be of help to others.

“I believe that representation is important… but if you don’t have the representation, how would you encourage children who can see male nurses,” he added. “You generally won’t see many male nurses, especially on the paediatric ward… but if you’re a patient, a child on the paediatric ward, you will see all the nurses are the ones who will be female nurses will be attending to you.”

First-year student Jason Alleyne, who intends to become a nurse practitioner, said: “I was always interested in the medical field. But I wanted to choose an area where it could be more well-rounded. So as nurses, we spend a lot of time with our patients, so we’re better able to understand how the medication and how the treatments are going because we’re spending constant time with them.”

Another scholarship recipient, second-year nursing student Cherise Oliver, said the $2 000 award will go a long way in supporting their studies at the college. Paying tribute to Mascoll, she said “Nursing is a team effort, and every role, no matter how small, is very crucial. Oftentimes this profession is overlooked, but a lot goes into it,” she added. “Her impact should be motivation for us to always treat patients and their loved ones with kindness, and to always seek to come from a place of understanding instead of judgement.”

She encouraged prospective nurses to examine their motivations carefully.

“Compassion, empathy, integrity and honesty are some of the key hallmarks that one must have to be a successful nurse. However, those are traits that we should have prior to signing up for the programme. I urge all nursing students to stand fast, work hard, and learn as much as possible because the journey may be arduous, but very rewarding in the end.”

(LG)