‘We do so much more than just give out Band-Aids,’ Bryan ISD school nurse weighs in on nationwide shortage

BRYAN, Texas (KBTX) – A Bryan ISD school nurse wants people to know that there’s more to her job than Band-Aids and ice packs.

Fanette Parks, a school nurse at Bryan Collegiate High School, said it’s a stereotype that’s part of a larger issue facing her field.

Public schools in Texas aren’t legally required to have a school nurse on staff, according to Laurie Smith, president of the Texas School Nurses Organization. As the school nursing industry faces a nationwide shortage, advocacy groups like this one are looking for solutions.

Smith said that one way to address the shortage is to require a school nurse on every public school campus.

“We know it’s important, now we’ve got to get it legislated,” she said.

According to Smith, the school nurse shortage is a small part of a broader shortage of nurses. Many medical professionals, especially school nurses, left the field during the pandemic.

“It was stressful, it was. It was scary,” Parks said.

But Smith said there aren’t many incentives to fill those spots.

“The average salary for an RN is around $76,800. For a school nurse that’s an RN, the average salary is about $56,000,” she said.

However, Parks said she’s not in it for the money. School nursing allowed her to pursue her passion while working on her children’s school schedules.

Parks has spent over a decade as a school nurse in Bryan ISD. She said she loves her job, but that negative misconceptions – like the belief that school nurses aren’t ‘real’ nurses – is keeping the career field from growing.

Around 16,000 kids attend school in Bryan ISD, with 32 nurses caring for them across 24 campuses.

She compared her nurse’s office to a “mini ER,” saying there’s more to her day than most people realize.

“It’s proven to be more challenging than I anticipated because of the chronic health conditions,” she said, “We care for kids that have asthma, pretty severe asthma, seizure disorders that we have to care for, Type 1 and Type 2 diabetes.”

Although Bryan ISD has a full staff, Parks said there’s still a gap. Not in personnel, rather, how they’re perceived.

“We need to dispel that myth that you don’t really do real nursing. Yeah, we do. We have kids with trachs. We do one-on-one care. We do, there is a lot that goes on that people just don’t realize,” she said.

A study from the National Association of School Nurses found less than 40 percent of the nation’s public schools have a full-time nurse.