Humans of NHC: Meet Lisa Julie, RN, MSN, PHN!

NHC San Francisco AmeriCorps Member, Emily Whalen, who is serving as the School-Based Dental Program Assistant with the San Francisco Department of Public Health's Dental Services, Maternal, Child & Adolescent Health Department for the 2023-2024 Service Term, sat down with Nurse Lisa Julie, a school nurse at Willie Brown Middle School, to discuss Nurse Julie's career path and trajectory! Read on to  learn about Nurse Julie's passion for health education and bridging health education gaps!

“It was a culmination of things that led me to nursing. I began as a nutrition assistant, learned I enjoyed teaching health, and then worked for the Red Cross. While working there, I became fascinated with emergency medicine. This led me to become an EMT, but during training, I realized I wanted to be like the nurse teaching and eventually became a nurse. I chose to work as a school nurse because I really have a passion for health education. My favorite things about being a school nurse are direct involvement with students and the various aspects of health in schools. There are extensive programs like dental, vision, and hearing screenings and small group lessons or assemblies around reproductive health, nutrition, and more.  I get to teach them how to incorporate health into their lives."

"The most challenging part about working with the schools is that there is little space for health education. There are many topics like mental health or substance use that need more time allocated for in-depth discussions. The district struggles to fill the health teacher positions in schools, and health classes tend to be pushed aside when schools have scheduling constraints. There is a gap in understanding that nutrition, sleep, and health all impact the behavioral and academic challenges we see in students. Our students are learning information regarding health from social media when it should be coming from us.”