Simmons College - Microcosm Yearbook (Boston, MA)

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of labs, lament and lend-lease After two-and-one-half years as a member of the Simmons family, she packed her toothbrush and her knowledge of underlying principles into an old bandana and emigrated to MGH or the Brig. The sudden loss of one-thirties, weekends, and the privileges of a casual culture was a temporarily stunning blow. Soon, however, she became an integral part of a specialized community. Here were simultaneous stimulation and frustration — a real- istic reason for delving into the vast body of ac- quired knowledge and a realization of new depths and fields of learning with inadequate time to make complete use of them. The nursing procedure lost its formidable importance and assumed a second- ary relationship to individuals and their problems. She searched the operating room waste bucket for a lost kidney stone; her experience in the diet kitchen was as fascinating as the salt-free cream of wheat she created there; she laughed, loved, griped, and cried a little — so the year passed. The next twelve months were filled with moving days and specialized affiliations. At the Children ' s Medical Center, she observed some of the most advanced methods of pediatrics, and read Gesell and Mother Goose while eating arrowroot cookies in the linen closet. The maternal instinct which had known healthy activity at Childten ' s received considerable kicking around at the Lying In. It became hyperactive in the nursery, slightly stifled on the post partum floors, and went into complete hibernation in the labor room. She raved about the food, griped about the bath tubs and fell in love with a premie. Rolling acres, spacious brick buildings, and a golf course gave McLean the appearance of a country club. What country club is equipped with flying eggnogs and a shock unit? After losing her initial fear of the psychiatric patient, she found that many of them were interesting and likable people. Through study of and association with various stages of ab- normal personality, she came to better understand herself and the vagaries of the so-called normal individual. In her fifth year, she returns to Simmons, more black coffee, concentrated doses of sanitation, ad- ministration, education, and — at last — graduation. Stay a moment! Mark her well! The changes in program (the student spends three full years at the college and the last two years in clinical work) doom her species to extinction within another year. Nevertheless, the end product will be essentially the same — a nurse sufficiently sttong in ideals and suffi- ciently flexible in ideas to play the important role as future Florence Nightingale. {29}

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Five-year plan Evangeline H. Morris, Director You have seen her wandering the corridors in February and March wearing sensible shoes, carry- ing a black bag, and waving a large bar graph de- picting the annual cost of garbage disposal. She is Simmons ' prodigal daughter, the fifth-year nurse. Bent over a cup of black coffee (spare the fatted calf), she spins the saga of the Five Year Plan. Her vocabulary ranges from Aschhiem to Zondek, but she will allow you access to her library which may include a medical dictionary and battered copies of Stearns, Starling, Kafka, and Millay. Memories of prodromal days include summer ses- sions in Boston, bedroom slippers fashioned from yesterday ' s Traveler, the history of the profession from Neanderthal woman to the Brown report, fragrant felines, cabbage au gratin on the Foods Lab floor, and the chronaxie that could be defined. Her timeless devotion to her freshman English instructor transferred to the Biology Department, and she had then passed the point of no return. Somebody sold her a limp white cloth which a Chinese laundry, two common pins, and a minimal blood loss transformed into a white winged cap. Mrs. Whitten helps budding microbiologists. Lorraine Langenfeld sits by while Pat checks pressure. Jocelyn Walker gets in forty winks while Barbara Smith and Anne Smith do their stuff. 128 }

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Prepro girls prepare for the Refuge from specialization and vocational training in any particular field can be found at Simmons. Undergrad preparation for graduate study can be found at Simmons. Where? Prepro, of course. Known either as gluttons for hard work or sloth, envied, immediately recognized, sometimes twitted, Prepro girls somehow manage to extract, simul- taneously, both a liberal arts background and a BS degree from their four college years at Simmons. Aided and abetted by Dr. Harley, Director of the School of Preprofessional Studies, these girls find it possible to cram in every course taught by their favorite instructor. The horizon of study is almost unlimited for this student; the academic confines of Simmons itself are the only academic confines other school. Usually, a student enters the Prepro school with a definite purpose in mind. Good healthy chunks of psych, lit, economics, sociology, history, government, and perhaps a language or two con- stitute the basis of the general preprofessional four- year program. However, there is a definite basic program neces- sary to prepare for certain specific fields. Medicine, dentistry, and nursing programs are based on re- quirements of the grade schools that will be attended. Students who expect to enter the library field after graduation follow this plan after the usual Simmons freshman program: Sophomore Year Contemporary Economic Society English Electives (8 year hours) Junior Year Psychology Electives (12 year hours) Senior Year Sociology Social Statistics Electives (12 year hours) Students who prepare for graduate social work follow a plan recommended by the Curriculum Com- mittee of the American Association of Schools of Social Work. After the standard freshman year: Sophomore Year Contemporary Economic Society English History of American Civilization Introduction to Psychology or Sociology Elective (2 year hours) •130 }