First Graduates of new VGCC Nursing program receive pins
Vance-Granville Community College held a ceremony May 11 to recognize the very first group of students to graduate with a Nursing degree at the college through the new LPN to ADN Completion Program. This new option helps Licensed Practical Nurses to continue their education with the Associate Degree Nursing program and then become Registered Nurses. Among those honored with distinctive nursing pins at the ceremonies were Chasity Holder of Creedmoor; Amy Darnell, Barbara Gwinn, Pamela Riggan and Brittany Simmons, all of Henderson; Amber Blackmon of Oxford; Elaine Overton of Kittrell; and Cleo Winters of Raleigh. Winters was also presented an honors certificate recognizing her high grade point average.
The special pinning ceremony was one of two held in the VGCC Civic Center that day. Hours later, a similar event honored graduates of the Associate Degree Nursing program taking courses in the traditional sequence .
VGCC Director of Nursing Gwendolyn Hackney and Dr. Randy Parker, the president of the college, congratulated the new graduates on their success and thanked the students’ friends and family members in attendance.
Maria Calloway, the Director of Nursing for Granville Health System, was the guest speaker. “Like you, I took the scenic route to being a registered nurse,” Calloway told the graduating students. She explained that she too was a licensed practical nurse before she earned a bachelor’s degree in nursing. “Today, these nurses, achieving this critical step in their nursing careers, have a great responsibility,” Calloway said. “We are now accountable for the outcomes of the future health of the communities we serve, and that is a tremendous responsibility. Professional nurses like you will have to take a leadership role to assist our patients, families and communities.”
Nursing instructor Jenny Holloway placed the VGCC pin on each graduate. After all graduates had received pins, the lights in the Civic Center were lowered, and the students recited the Nursing Pledge by lamp-light.
Above: Members of VGCC’s first LPN to ADN Completion Program class included, in front from left, Brittany Simmons, Pamela Riggan, Amber Blackmon and Amy Darnell; in back from left, Cleo Winters, Chasity Holder, Elaine Overton and Barbara Gwinn. (VGCC Photo)
