Nursing becomes a vital part of you, according to Brenda Ernst, who spent 36 years as a nurse and eventually rose through the ranks to become a vice president of nursing.
When she retired, her life-shaping nursing experiences inspired her to establish a nursing scholarship at Goldfarb School of Nursing at Barnes-Jewish College through The Foundation for Barnes-Jewish Hospital.
“Nursing education is so important, yet it has become so expensive,” Brenda says. “Through my giving, I want to help educate more nurses to address the health care challenges we will be facing with an aging population. It’s an exciting time in nursing education and I can’t think of a better place to invest my money.”
Brenda’s desire to care for others also sparked her interest in donating toward a new hospice house on the campus of Barnes-Jewish West County Hospital. Both her husband, Mike, and her mother benefited from hospice care before they passed away.
“I feel strongly about taking care of people in the last stages of life,” Brenda says. “Hospice allows people to live and die gracefully. In a community as big as ours, we’re not complete without a hospice house.”