\u201cI decided to apply to the UConn MEIN program because of its proximity to my home, and the ability of the School of Nursing to provide many unique clinical experiences,\u201d Goodrich says.<\/p>\n
After what Goodrich called \u201ca year of the hardest work I have ever done,\u201d he passed his NCLEX exam in 2010 and became a registered nurse.<\/p>\n
Following graduation, he became a staff nurse at St. Francis Hospital and Medical Center in Hartford, where over the course of 10 years he worked in the cardiac surgery unit, the emergency department, the cardiovascular intensive care unit (CICU), and finally in cardiac testing.<\/p>\n
While working as a staff nurse in Hartford, Goodrich pursued his Master of Science in Nursing through the University of Hartford, graduating in 2017. During his master\u2019s program, he concentrated on nursing education, which led him to begin teaching as a clinical instructor at Capitol Community College and Goodwin University. He also taught at the University of Hartford, where he helped lead an educational trip to Iceland. The trip was designed to teach undergraduate and graduate nursing students about nursing education and health care in Iceland, but it also introduced Goodrich to Halld\u00f3rsd\u00f3ttir and her work on the science of caring.<\/p>\n \u201cI had also read an article titled \u2018Overcoming strangeness and communication barriers: a phenomenological study of becoming a foreign nurse,\u2019 by H. Magnusdottir,\u201d Goodrich says. \u201cThe author talked to foreign nurses who came to Iceland to practice.\u201d<\/p>\n The article featured the comments of a foreign nurse who discussed workload, stress, staffing, and rushes of Icelandic health care: \u201cI can sit down and have a cup of coffee with the patient and talk to him about things, where in [my country] you are running more from task to task,\u201d the nurse told the article\u2019s author.<\/p>\n Similar differences between United States health care and Scandinavian nursing stood out to Goodrich during his trip abroad. \u201cGoing there and learning about how the nurses were educated and thought about their job was very different from my experiences in the United States,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Iceland, in comparison to the United States, has universal health care with government-employed union nurses. They are taught to work in large city hospitals as well as remote clinics.<\/p>\n Goodrich says nurses in Iceland are very actively involved in research and have a large variety of nursing knowledge. \u201cThis is amazing for a country with only 370,000 people and about 4,000 nurses,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n But Goodrich notes that there are still some flaws to nursing in Iceland.<\/p>\n \u201cThey still have a nursing shortage, and nurses are not as well-paid as in other Scandinavian countries, so not everything is perfect,\u201d Goodrich says. \u201cBut their culture of taking care of their neighbors informs\u00a0their nursing and health care.\u201d<\/p>\n He says the\u00a0trip was transformative for him: \u201cI can talk about Iceland for a long time.\u201d<\/p>\n After his return, Goodrich chose to further his education. In 2020, during the COVID-19 pandemic, he applied to the Ph.D. program at UConn School of Nursing.<\/p>\n \u201cThis was a huge step for me,\u201d Goodrich says. However, he says he already felt comfortable with UConn’s doctoral program, because Yale professor Mark Lazenby<\/a> \u2014 whose work Goodrich had followed during his master\u2019s program \u2014 had recently joined the UConn faculty. Because Goodrich had used some of Lazenby\u2019s work in his teaching, he requested Lazenby as his major advisor throughout his studies at UConn.<\/p>\n Goodrich credits the School of Nursing\u2019s Ph.D. program for its wide range of specialties, especially among faculty. \u201cSome professors have literally written the book on their research topics and methods,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n Goodrich says he\u00a0appreciates how Lazenby has served as an incredible mentor during his studies, pushing him to consider how compassion serves as an ethical and moral imperative in nursing.<\/p>\n He also credits two other faculty members for mentoring him during this educational journey: \u201cDr. Carol Polifroni<\/a> has helped guide me though the process of nursing academia and Dr. Cheryl Beck<\/a> has taught me how qualitative research can be applied to my research questions.\u201d<\/p>\n While he\u2019s still working toward his Ph.D., Goodrich already has plans for the future. \u201cI wish to teach undergraduates the basics\u00a0of nursing and continue exploring concepts in the Scandinavian science of caring,\u201d he says, which will likely lead him back to Iceland.<\/p>\n Additionally, during his studies and future career, he hopes to work with other nursing experts to design curriculums on compassionate competence for nursing school programs.<\/p>\n \u201cUConn School of Nursing has allowed me to look at nursing in a new way, and they let me pursue my passions in my research,\u201d Goodrich says. \u201cI find it challenging and invigorating.\u201d<\/p>\n The UConn School of Nursing Ph.D. Program is currently accepting applications. Learn more about the program at phd.nursing.uconn.edu<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n Follow the UConn School of Nursing on\u00a0Facebook<\/a>,\u00a0Instagram<\/a>,\u00a0Twitter<\/a>, or\u00a0LinkedIn<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" George Goodrich ’09 (NUR) worked in paramedicine and public radio before finding his way to nursing \u2014 and now has returned to UConn to pursue his doctorate<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":156,"featured_media":177976,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_crdt_document":"","wds_primary_category":0,"wds_primary_series":0,"wds_primary_attribution":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[147,1877,2231,2076],"tags":[],"magazine-issues":[],"coauthors":[2356],"class_list":["post-177909","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-alumni","category-nur","category-health-well-being","category-research"],"pp_statuses_selecting_workflow":false,"pp_workflow_action":"current","pp_status_selection":"publish","acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-04-19 22:24:29","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177909","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/users\/156"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=177909"}],"version-history":[{"count":9,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177909\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":178025,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/posts\/177909\/revisions\/178025"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media\/177976"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=177909"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=177909"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=177909"},{"taxonomy":"magazine-issue","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/magazine-issues?post=177909"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-rest\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=177909"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"\"](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/IMG_0731-300x225.jpg\")
![\"\"](\"https:\/\/today.uconn.edu\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/10\/IMG_0693-300x225.jpg\")