I would like to share with you some of my experiences of discrimination, abuse and persecution while I was a nursing student at the University of Northern British Columbia.
On January 13, 2010, in one of our clinical practicum placements, Sarah Hanson, my
instructor for NURS 315 (mental health nursing - practicum) told me to leave the nursing
program and forget about becoming a registered nurse because she was going to
fail me. Sarah justified her decision on
the grounds that I was an English Second Language student and a
single mother. This threat was Sarah
Hanson’s
response to me after I informed her about my inability to log into the mental health
computer training system for NURS 315 at the hospital. As it turned out, it was not
my fault that I could not log in: someone had misspelled one letter in my name. But
Sarah Hanson would not admit that she had been wrong to blame me. Instead, Sarah Hanson failed me. I protested, but
her action was supported by the lead instructor for that course (Lyle Grant)
and by the Chair of UNBC’s Nursing Program, Martha MacLeod. As punishment
for arguing about their decision to fail me, Lyle Grant created a special
learning contract for NURS 315 and together with Sarah Hanson forced me (by threats during my clinical practicum) into
the “learning contract” which included making me do a module (mini-course) on
“communications skills” as one of its requirements and which was not part of this nursing program. They also distributed
their negative views about me to my other nursing instructors, my clinical
practicum placements, and my classmates. They even tried to persuade some
instructors in my other nursing courses to fail me.
Repeatedly at UNBC I experienced aggressive and hostile behavior towards me. This included swearing, yelling and calling me (in a UNBC classroom) a "fucking English second language student." Repeatedly I was shown the middle finger and threatened. I also received abusive or offensive phone calls at my home. Those who perpetrated the abuse have now become registered nurses, while UNBC faculty members stood aside and allowed this mistreatment to happen.
Repeatedly at UNBC I experienced aggressive and hostile behavior towards me. This included swearing, yelling and calling me (in a UNBC classroom) a "fucking English second language student." Repeatedly I was shown the middle finger and threatened. I also received abusive or offensive phone calls at my home. Those who perpetrated the abuse have now become registered nurses, while UNBC faculty members stood aside and allowed this mistreatment to happen.
I retook NURS 315 in the fall of 2010 under a
different instructor and passed. I also passed all my other courses until
I got to my final practicum, NURS 440 (community health nursing), which I took
from February to April 2012. In fact, I was one of the best students in
the nursing program and received some of the highest marks. However,
sometime before the start of NURS 440, Martha MacLeod sent my file --
containing records of my clash with Sarah Hanson and Lyle Grant in NURS 315 -- to
my instructor for NURS 440, Khaldoun Aldiabat, a new faculty member lacking job
security and with very little experience of registered nursing in Canada.
Initially Khaldoun Aldiabat passed me on my midterm evaluation, but when I
returned it to him because he had forgotten to put my surname and satisfactory
completion of all assignments on it, he changed my grade to failure, and
demanded that I redo the same communications module which Sarah and Lyle had
used to punish, humiliate and fail me two years earlier. When I refused,
Khaldoun Aldiabat failed me on my final evaluation, even though the registered
nurses who had actually overseen my NURS 440 practicum had all graded my
performance as satisfactory. In addition, Khaldoun Aldiabat accused me of having
complained to UNBC faculty about his poor teaching. (The complaint had
actually been made by another student to Martha MacLeod.) Alone among my classmates, I was subjected
to an oral final exam of nearly two hours at Northern Health's facility. All the rest of Khaldoun
Aldiabat’s students had their evaluation done by electronic submission of
documents. (In all other nursing clinical practicum courses, when face to
face evaluation was done, it only lasted 15-20 minutes, not for two hours as
happened in my case.) Khaldoun never
came to watch me or any other nursing student on our practicum. After
the due date of our midterm grades, Khaldoun Aldiabat began changing his
expectations for our assignments and failing almost everything I submitted to
him. Khaldoun Aldiabat also warned the nurses who were overseeing my work
that I was a special case and asked them to report to him more thoroughly about
me than any of the other nursing students and pressured them. He was
rude, aggressive, and displayed his problems with anger management.
In 2010 and 2012 I complained to UNBC’s
student union, ombudsperson, Chair of UNBC’s Undergraduate Nursing Program
(Lela Zimmer), Chair of UNBC’s Nursing Program (Martha MacLeod), UNBC's Dean (John Young), UNBC's Senate, and the president of UNBC
(George Iwama), but they all ignored me. Moreover, the dean responsible
for UNBC’s nursing program admitted to me that I was not the first student left
without a degree at the end of UNBC’s program. Only those UNBC nursing
students facing failure who were able to hire a lawyer have been able to gain
at least partial redress for their grievances; but I cannot afford a
lawyer. And recently (in 2011), UNBC prohibited its students from having
legal representation during the appeal process. In 2012, even before I
submitted my documents for the appeal of my failing grade in NURS 440, I was
informed that they would fail me.
Each year UNBC fails one or two nursing
students (out of approximately 100 in this collaborative nursing
program) just before graduation. Most of the graduates
complete the program with grades well below mine. Some have only a C in
their theory courses and a bare Pass in their clinical courses. Note as
well that UNBC’s nursing program requires 136 credits to graduate, while
Kwantlen’s only demands 125.5 for the same nursing degree.
Failure in this course, NURS 440, meant that
I could not graduate with my Bachelor of Science in Nursing. Failure
prohibited me from writing my Registered Nurse exam and receiving my license
allowing me to work as a registered nurse. In turn, that caused me to
lose the registered nurse job I had been promised in one part of the hospital. Now, instead, I owe a huge student debt with no means of repaying
it -- or of supporting myself and my child.
I am despairing of obtaining my registered nurse degree and am horrified
at UNBC’s ability to get away with its discrimination, abuse, and persecution towards me. I
have simply been brushed off. A lawyer
told me that I definitely need to hire my own lawyer in order to defend my
rights against UNBC in court and that mine is a human rights case. But I
cannot afford a lawyer or the other legal expenses which would be associated with a court case against UNBC. Legal Aid assists low income people only for
family, criminal, and immigration matters and that kind of help is
limited. They will not provide legal aid to me in my situation. Almost all
pro bono lawyers or student lawyers provide their services only to low income
people who live in Vancouver or Victoria. Moreover, pro bono lawyers only give advice
and do not provide representation in court.
And without legal representation, I am unable to defend my rights against UNBC and receive my registered nurse degree. UNBC ruined my life and that of my child.
The
estimated price of studying in Canada is approximately $20,000 per year.
Yours truly,
Yours truly,
Tetyana M.
Stop UNBC's discrimination and abuse against an immigrant single mother and her child
Please help me get my nursing degree from UNBC, so I can find a job, pay back my student debt, and support myself and my child.
You can sign my petition
by clicking here.
Please support us and pass this petition on to others to sign.
Chairs of
nursing schools can declare any nursing student “unsuitable” just as a matter
of personal dislike for that person.
Stop UNBC's discrimination and abuse against an immigrant single mother and her child
Please help me get my nursing degree from UNBC, so I can find a job, pay back my student debt, and support myself and my child.
You can sign my petition
by clicking here.
Please support us and pass this petition on to others to sign.
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