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Around the world to Bethel College
Two nursing students from Nigeria, living in Arizona, find a Kansas college on the Internet
by Melanie Zuercher
After they’d traveled halfway around the world, in the end the Internet brought Sade Ayodele and Victoria Charles to Bethel College.
Sade and Victoria both graduated from Bethel May 25 with degrees in nursing. Although both come from Nigeria, they are from different parts of the country (Akure, a city in the south, and Anambra State in the southeast, respectively), come from different ethnic groups and speak different tribal languages. They might never have met, except that their husbands, Tim Ayodele and Emmanuel Charles, both happened to work for the computer giant Intel.
Emmanuel got a job in Houston, where Victoria joined him. Tim got a job in Sacramento, which is where Sade first came to the United States. And then both men got transferred to the Phoenix area.
“Nursing is what I love from childhood,” Victoria says. “From the moment I came to the United States, I started [working for my] CNA” – certified nurse assistant, what used to be called nurse aide.
“Caring for people has always been in me,” Sade says. However, it was her experience giving birth to her first son while in California that most affected her choice of profession, she says.
“I saw how well they treated me and took care of me,” she says. “The attention and care was fabulous. It made me cry to think of how women were treated in my country. I decided, ‘I want to go into nursing – I can’t help everyone but I can help some.’”
When Sade and Victoria arrived with their families in Phoenix, they both enrolled in nursing pre-requisite courses at Chandler Community College.
“We met because of a tutoring session,” Sade remembers. “The tutor told me, ‘There is one other African student, and I want you to meet her.’ So we met and found out we were both from Nigeria. Our husbands have now become friends.”
“We speak different dialects, so we have to communicate in English,” Victoria adds.
At about the time the women were ready to start applying to baccalaureate nursing programs, Intel indicated it would be transferring their husbands to the Kansas City area. So they went to the Internet to look for programs in Kansas.
“Bethel admitted us and so did a school in Chicago,” Sade says, “but Bethel was closer [to Kansas City] than Chicago, and Chicago is too cold.”
Sade and Victoria came to Newton in fall 2006 without their families – Victoria has two sons, 8 and 6, and Sade has three, 9, 8 and 6 – since school started for them before their husbands were ready to move. And then, after one semester, came the word that Tim and Emmanuel would not be leaving their jobs in Arizona after all.
However, Victoria and Sade decided to stay. “Bethel is the house of God,” Sade says. “It was a shelter for us.”
For the past two years, they have seen their husbands and children only at Christmas breaks and in the summer. “It hasn’t been easy,” Victoria says. “They miss us, but they know that we need to study. And we miss them so much, but nursing is our calling from God.
“Bethel and Newton have been wonderful communities,” she continues. “We saw how international people were received, compared from living in Houston or Phoenix. We have been treated so well here. I feel at home here. I miss my family but still I’m satisfied – it’s like I have another family here.”
Sade says, “It was so marvelous – we went to Dillon’s [grocery store] the first day we were here, and we didn’t know anyone, and we were treated so well. [The nursing department] has been like a home away from home. Sharon [Unruh, assistant director of nursing] is like a mom to all of us. She would tell us, ‘Don’t panic, calm down, you’ll make it.’ She’s one of those who kept us going.
“I haven’t regretted at all coming here. I cried [the week before Commencement] – I will miss it so much.”
“This place has been like a blessing to us,” Victoria says. “Even when our husbands changed their minds [about moving], we said, ‘We’re comfortable here, we’re staying.’”
“The director of nursing [Gregg Schroeder ’92] is a man who believes in equal treatment, who listens to problems,” Sade says. “His door is always open. At some schools, you would have to wait until next week to see the director of nursing.”
“He’s like our father,” Victoria adds. “No matter how busy, he finds time to help you, to solve your problem. All the faculty have been there for us when we need them.”
(Schroeder has since resigned as director of nursing to return to full-time teaching in the department.)
The two women rented an apartment together and shared one car. The nursing faculty worked with them so that their schedules and clinical sites would be similar, in order to help with transportation issues.
They both got jobs at Mirror, Inc., a residential and outpatient treatment program for substance abuse, and then at ResCare, which provides support and services for people with disabilities and young people with special needs. “They love us at ResCare and don’t want us to go,” Sade says.
They also attended Hillcrest Community Church in Newton, another place where they felt welcomed and at home, they say.
Most immediately, now that they are finished with classes and clinicals, Sade and Victoria will study for and then take the NCLEX, the National Council of State Boards of Nursing exam that qualifies them to be licensed as registered nurses. And then, both hope one day to return to their home country to practice, especially with women of childbearing age.
“I want to help,” Sade says. “I want to change things, especially in the OB ward.”
Victoria echoes her. “I want to help my people,” she says. “They need experienced nurses. And I want to teach different ways of doing things, especially in the treatment of women giving birth.”