The Continuing Challenge for Nursing

Abstract

McGill University John Gardner wrote a decade ago: Institutions have been caught in the savage crossfire between uncritical lovers and unloving critics! On the one side, those who loved their institutions tended to smother them in an embrace of death, loving their rigidities more than their promise and shielding them from life-giving criticism. On the other side, there arose a breed of critics without love, skilled in demolition, but untutored in the arts by which human institutions are nurtured and strengthened and made to flourish. Where human institutions are concerned, love without criticism brings stagnation; and criticism without love brings destruction. (Gardner, 1970). Today I consider myself a loving critic of nursing and nursing education as we explore and expose some of the issues and dilemmas which present a continuing challenge for nursing. Since special sessions relating to baccalaureate, masters and doctoral preparation will be held, my remarks shall be confined to what I believe to be a few important broad areas. The first of these areas could be called "the situation in which universities in Canada find themselves". We are an association of university schools and the university as an institution must be a major concern. We must be loving critics of this institution. All universities are, of course, not the same. Yet there is an amazing number of facets of university existence, survival, and operation which are always relevant to a greater or lesser degree.