ALUMNI DIRECTORY

Mr. Vidourek is currently studying the Doctorate of Nursing Practice at The Ohio State University. After receiving a bachelor’s degree in music, Mr. Vidourek completed a 12-month accelerated bachelor of nursing program. Currently, he has over nine years of emergency department (ED) experience (five years in a level one pediatric trauma center/4 years in a level one adult trauma center), and 5 years in the vascular access specialty. He was selected as the ED “Nurse of the Year” while in the pediatric ED and was the recipient of the Daisy Award for Extraordinary Nurses as a staff nurse in the adult ED. Mr. Vidourek’s doctoral project is aimed at improving pediatric readiness within non-pediatric emergency departments.

Cidalia Vital, MS, RN, CNL, CPAN is the Magnet Nursing Program Director for Baystate Medical Center in Springfield Massachusetts. She has been involved with the Magnet program for Baystate since 2011 as one of the primary authors of their recent redesignation document. She has served on several national and state nursing boards representing the interests of new graduate nurses as a Vice President of ANA- Massachusetts from 2007-2009 as well as a Director for the American Board of Perianesthesia Nurses as a Director promoting the importance of specialty certification in perianesthesia. Cidalia has spent the last 13 years of her nursing career advancing the practice of nursing through her research on post-operative urinary retention as well as promoting lateral violence and bullying prevention through video from the Centers of Disease Control and Prevention. Cidalia is passionate about promoting clinical inquiry at the bedside. She has fostered over 120 clinical nurses to participate in a successful Art of Questioning Campaign which encouraged evidence based practice through PICOT. Cidalia holds a bachelor’s degree in nursing from College of Our Lady of the Elms, a master’s in nursing from University of Massachusetts Amherst and is pursuing her PhD in nursing at UMASS. She has been recognized with numerous awards for her outstanding leadership and excellence in practice. Cidalia was honored as the recipient of the Elms College Distinguished Alumni in Nursing Excellence Award in 2014. Cidalia just recently graduated from the Massachusetts Organization of Nurse Leaders Academy in the spring 2016.

I am a PhD candidate at the University of Northern Colorado. My area of research is emancipatory knowing and service learning in clinical nursing education. I currently teach in the undergraduate program with Oregon Health and Science University in Ashland, Oregon. My area of expertise is population health and nursing leadership. I am the project co-manager for the Interprofessional Care Access Network (I-CAN). I-CAN is a nurse-led, community-based interprofessional health care delivery and educational program that addresses the Triple Aim for vulnerable populations in urban neighborhoods and rural communities in Oregon.

Kyra Waligora graduated summa cum laude from high school with an AA degree and subsequently graduated summa cum laude from Florida Atlantic University with a BSN. She has been employed as a registered nurse in an oncology-hematology unit for approximately two years and is ONS/ONCC chemotherapy and biotherapy certified. As an undergraduate, she collaborated on a variety of research projects, including one which studied stress levels in patients with Alzheimer’s disease and their caregivers and another which implemented strategies to reduce patient transfers from long term care facilities to acute care settings. She also received funding to pursue her own research study, investigating the impact adult day centers have on memory impaired older adults and their caregivers. Her research interests and passions involve enhancing the health and well-being of people with neurodegenerative diseases by using mind-body complementary and alternative therapies to manage symptoms and improve mobility. Ms. Waligora will be pursuing a nursing PhD at Johns Hopkins University, where she plans to continue research with adult day centers and investigate new, innovative ways to manage symptoms of the cognitively impaired aging population.

Mark Walker is a 2011 graduate of the University of Maryland School of Nursing Clinical Nurse Leader program and the recipient of a Robert Wood Johnson Scholarship. As part of his CNL program, his capstone paper addressed spirituality and its importance in nursing care. He has guest lectured on the topic for both undergraduate and graduate courses during his tenure a student and clinical instructor. He began his Doctoral studies at the University of Maryland in 2014 and is researching the impact of compassion on nursing practice and patient outcomes. He currently serves as an Assistant Professor in the School of Nursing at Notre Dame of Maryland University and still maintains his bedside practice at Medstar Union Memorial Hospital. With the completion of his doctoral studies he intends to research and implement methods that will improve the quality of nursing education to foster compassion and resilience in the nurses.