Dishing Up the Modern Family over Breakfast

If you read The Huffington Post, you may subscribe to the current belief that breakfast is not the most important meal of the day. UCalgary’s Faculty of Nursing begs to differ — at least four times a year. Its Food for Thoughtbreakfast series is a meal with a mission and, on November 26, it begins its second year of serving up daybreak dishes with a side of education for alumni and the community.

This month’s presentation, “Reinventing the modern family,” to be delivered by professor and Palix/Alberta Children’s Hospital Foundation Chair in Parent-Infant Health, Nicole Letourneau, kicks off another exciting slate of topics. Her community-based program of research explores parenting, attachment and child development in the context of family violence, maternal depression and substance abuse — and seeks to develop evidence to guide best practice in parent-child support and intervention.  She is the first UCalgary nursing faculty member to be named a fellow of the Canadian Academy of Health Sciences. In 2015, she received the College of Registered Nurses of Alberta’s award for Excellence in Nursing Research. 

But let’s back up. The successful series was created as a reaction to responses Faculty of Nursing dean, Dianne Tapp, received when she gave presentations to various communities — from the Rotary Club to the University Senate. “Public understanding of the work nurses do can be limited; they don’t make a connection to the fact that nurses are scholars.”

In the faculty’s current strategic plan, the pillar of ‘creating a culture of community’ includes outreach beyond just partners and stakeholders. “That large umbrella emphasizes building a greater appreciation of the role nurses play; that will increase opportunities for collaboration and innovation, but will also enhance the profile and reputation of our faculty and the profession in general.”

Maria Martens, the faculty’s director of development, experienced similar reactions to that of the dean when meeting with nursing alumni and donors.  “I was hearing ‘we don’t know what you are doing in the faculty’ and ‘nurses do research?’” Martens says.  “I realized we needed to do more to showcase our research in the community because our own alumni were not aware of the difference we are making.”

In November 2014, the series kicked off at the Hotel Alma when Kids Cancer Care Foundation Chair in Child and Family Cancer Care Nancy Moules spoke about her research into childhood cancer and its effects on the family dynamic.  Moules, an alumna herself, appreciated the chance to talk to a wide audience about her passion.

“Other researchers at our university might know vaguely what I research, but not about all of the projects, so it was a good opportunity to connect with those people and give them a broader understanding of the scope of my research,” Moules adds.  “But for practitioners who came from the community and for our alumni who don’t work in my area, they may encounter people experiencing cancer in some area of their life and I hope our work might help them gain a new perspective.”

Other topics have included healthy aging and saving lives with simulation. And, in 2016, the series will be sponsored by Amica at Aspen Woods, a non-traditional, mature lifestyles community, dedicated to creating and sustaining superior retirement residences.

“We are so excited to have Amica on board,” says Martens.  “Amica’s commitment to provide education and lifelong learning in their communities aligns with our breakfast series where we hope to educate, inform and inspire the community.”

For more information on the November 26 talk, visit http://nursing.ucalgary.ca/breakfast-series