“Nursing school is tough, but it’s an attainable goal if you want it bad enough"
Penn State Abington and Frankford Hospital School of Nursing, now part of Aria Health, have had a long relationship over 30 years, in fact. The most recent beneficiary of this relationship are the class of 2009 nursing school graduates. Of the 71 students who received their Nursing diploma from Aria Health (formerly Frankford Hospital) on May 6, 18 also received their associate degree from Penn State Abington. Lisa Olewnick (with Mayor Nutter, right) was one of these high achieving graduates.
Olewnick, 38, always wanted to be a nurse but wove her way through several careers before landing her coveted nurse’s job. She started in the Navy, moved into law enforcement, counseled challenged teenagers, worked for a domestic abuse agency, and also shared her talents as an ambulance driver, EMT, and emergency room technician.
According to Olewnick, “Nursing school is tough, but it’s an attainable goal if you want it bad enough. My education means the world to me. I loved the Penn State Abington instructors that came to Frankford Hospital to teach. You can tell you’re not just a number with them. With some of the harder classes the instructors would make you laugh when you really wanted to be crying. I was amazed to what extent they would go, to make sure you got it. My microbiology teacher, Ms. Feldman-Rosen, dressed up like a mosquito to teach us how Malaria is transmitted. Some things will stick in your head forever.”
Olewnick received three job offers before she graduated, offers which she attributes to her education. She’s currently working as an emergency room nurse at Geisinger Medical Center in Danville, Pennsylvania. Olewnick is also in the Army Reserve and hoping to be commissioned at the end of May as an officer in the medical core, to work as a nurse. And if that’s not enough to keep Olewnick busy, she will be continuing her education with Penn State as she starts her bachelor’s degree in Nursing through Penn State World Campus.
