PUHI — Five second-year Kauai Community College Nursing students recently received the Jo Douglass Nursing Scholarships from Jim Douglass in honor of his late mother, Jo Douglass.
“It is an honor to me to honor my mom and my dad,” Jim Douglass said in a release from KCC. “My mom has always been in the game of helping people in various ways in healthcare.”
Scholarships, and a rose, were presented to Gillian Perdido, Heather Seely, Madison Keane, John Nostares and Ashlie Williams.
“I’m a mom of three young daughters,” Seely said. “Being a nurse has always been a dream of mine, and I realized there was never going to be an easy time. I’m so inspired by all the nurses who came before me.”
Perdido said both her parents were nurses, and they inspired her to go into the healthcare field.
“My mom graduated from the program here,” Perdido said. “My dad was an Emergency Room nurse, and I want to be an ER nurse.”
Nostares was born and raised in the Philippines.
“I was working as a medical assistant and was inspired to go back to school to become a nurse,” he said.
Nursing Instructor Sharon Ehlers said that scholarships like the Jo Douglass Nursing Scholarships help students to have more time to focus on their studies.
“When a students gets a scholarship, that takes away a piece of the financial burden, and they don’t have to work so much,” Ehlers said. “Your generosity is not just appreciated by the students, but by the staff as well.”
Jim Douglass said his parents taught him to always give back to his community, and the scholarship presentations are just one of his efforts.
Jo Douglass, originally from Kalaheo, studied at KCC before furthering her education on Oahu, then finding work as a surgical nurse for 35 years in Central Illinois.
Following her retirement, she moved home to Kauai and continued to work in hospice.
Jo Douglass was one of the first nurse aides at Wilcox Hospital, Jim Douglass said, and he and his sister presented the idea of an endowed scholarship in his mother’s honor to her just before she passed in 2023.
Source: The Garden Island
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