{"id":126794,"date":"2024-01-25T18:01:18","date_gmt":"2024-01-25T23:01:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=126794"},"modified":"2024-01-25T18:01:53","modified_gmt":"2024-01-25T23:01:53","slug":"surprise-pinning-by-grandmother-at-st-lukes-nursing-graduation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/?p=126794","title":{"rendered":"Surprise \u201cPinning\u201d by Grandmother at St. Luke\u2019s Nursing Graduation"},"content":{"rendered":"

Photo caption: Rachael Martin (right) is pinned by her grandmother, Peggy Hoffman (left), 1958 St. Luke\u2019s School of Nursing grad, with help from Rachael\u2019s aunt, Janine Harris, also a nurse.<\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

Rachael Martin\u2019s graduation from St. Luke\u2019s School of Nursing (SON) took a surprising and heartwarming turn when the 23-year-old\u2019s grandmother \u2014 herself a 1958 SON graduate \u2014 rose to her feet to join in the traditional \u201cpinning\u201d ceremony.<\/p>\n

Pinning is the symbolic ceremony of welcoming graduating nurses to the caring profession, which has been deemed the most trusted in the world. St. Luke\u2019s SON held graduation on the evening of December 14.<\/p>\n

Unknown to Rachael, a 2018 Palisades High School graduate who lives in\u00a0Riegelsville, her mother, Becky Martin, and grandmother, Peggy Hoffman, were planning to surprise Rachael when she received her School of Nursing pin.<\/p>\n

Her grandmother, Peggy Hoffman, is a 1958 graduate of St. Luke\u2019s School of Nursing. For several years before starting a family, she had worked and taught nursing students at the St. Luke\u2019s Bethlehem hospital and at Northampton Community College.<\/p>\n

Rachael considers her grandmother her role model. \u201cShe\u2019s has always been very important to me and influenced me to become a nurse,\u201d said Rachael, who has worked as a patient care assistant in the emergency department at St. Luke\u2019s Anderson Campus and plans to start in the nurse internship program there in January.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had mentioned to my family how neat it would be if my grandmother could pin me, considering she is an alumna of the School of Nursing,\u201d\u00a0recalls Rachael, \u201cbut I didn\u2019t think further into the idea.\u201d This wish set into motion a scheme hatched by her mother and grandmother.<\/p>\n

As the pinning got underway at Nitschmann Middle School in Bethlehem, each of the 52 graduating nurses climbed up the steps to the center of the stage to be pinned by Alyssa Villegas, MSN, one of their instructors. All eyes were on each student on the most important day of their educational journey.<\/p>\n

When it was Rachael\u2019s turn to have her St. Luke\u2019s School of Nursing pin attached to the collar of her uniform, Villegas surprised her.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe told me \u2018You\u2019re going to give this pin to the woman standing down there,\u2019\u201d pointing to Rachael\u2019s grandmother, who was standing at the bottom of the stage.\u00a0So focused on the ceremony, Rachael hadn\u2019t seen her family in front of the auditorium.<\/p>\n

There, at the foot of the stage, were her mother, grandmother and\u00a0Rachael\u2019s Aunt Janine Harris, a nurse anesthetist who came to the ceremony from her home in Colorado, waiting for Rachael with big smiles.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was such as surprise!\u201d she recalls.<\/p>\n

When Rachael realized what was about to take place, \u201cI was hysterical!\u201d<\/p>\n

Hoffman pinned her granddaughter, gave her a hug and kiss, and the audience erupted in applause.<\/p>\n

\u201cI cried,\u201d said Rachael. \u201cMy grandmother cried, and I think the entire audience cried!\u201d<\/p>\n

The surprise pinning was the emotional high point for Rachael and her family–and quite possibly for everyone there. In that memorable moment, the nursing history in that family was extended to another generation who got her start at St. Luke\u2019s School of Nursing, the longest continuously operating nursing school in the country.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

About St. Luke\u2019s<\/strong><\/p>\n

Founded in 1872,\u00a0St. Luke\u2019s University Health Network<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0(SLUHN) is a fully integrated, regional, non-profit network of more than 20,000 employees providing services at 15 campuses and 300+ outpatient sites.\u00a0 With annual net revenue of $3.4 billion, the Network\u2019s service area includes 11 counties in two states: Lehigh, Northampton, Berks, Bucks, Carbon, Montgomery, Monroe, Schuylkill and Luzerne counties in Pennsylvania and Warren and Hunterdon counties in New Jersey. St. Luke\u2019s hospitals operate the largest network of trauma centers in Pennsylvania, with the Bethlehem Campus being home to St. Luke\u2019s Children\u2019s Hospital.<\/p>\n

Dedicated to advancing medical education, St. Luke\u2019s is the preeminent teaching hospital in central-eastern Pennsylvania.\u00a0 In partnership with Temple University, the Network established the Lehigh Valley\u2019s first and only four-year medical school campus.\u00a0 It also operates the nation\u2019s longest continuously operating School of Nursing, established in 1884, and 45 fully accredited graduate medical educational programs with more than 400 residents and fellows. In 2022, St. Luke\u2019s, a member of the Children\u2019s Hospital Association, opened the Lehigh Valley\u2019s first and only free-standing facility dedicated entirely to kids.<\/p>\n

SLUHN is the only Lehigh Valley-based health care system to earn Medicare\u2019s\u00a0five-star<\/em>\u00a0ratings (the highest) for quality, efficiency and patient satisfaction.\u00a0 It is both a Leapfrog Group and Healthgrades\u00a0Top Hospital<\/em>\u00a0and a Newsweek World\u2019s\u00a0Best Hospital<\/em>.\u00a0 The Network\u2019s flagship University Hospital has earned the\u00a0100 Top Major Teaching Hospital<\/em>\u00a0designation from Fortune\/PINC AI 11 times total and eight years in a row, including in 2023 when it was identified as THE #4 TEACHING HOSPITAL IN THE COUNTRY.\u00a0 In 2021, St. Luke\u2019s was identified as one of the\u00a015 Top Health Systems<\/em>\u00a0nationally.\u00a0 Utilizing the Epic electronic medical record (EMR) system for both inpatient and outpatient services, the Network is a multi-year recipient of the\u00a0Most Wired<\/em>\u00a0award recognizing the breadth of the SLUHN\u2019s information technology applications such as telehealth, online scheduling and online pricing information. \u00a0The Network is also recognized as one of the state\u2019s lowest cost providers.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Information provided to TVL by:
\nSam Kennedy<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photo caption: Rachael Martin (right) is pinned by her grandmother, Peggy Hoffman (left), 1958 St. Luke\u2019s School of Nursing grad, with help from Rachael\u2019s aunt, Janine Harris, also a nurse. … Continue reading Surprise \u201cPinning\u201d by Grandmother at St. Luke\u2019s Nursing Graduation<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":126795,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-126794","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-in-the-valley"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/01\/nurse-pinning.jpg","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126794"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=126794"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/126794\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/126795"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=126794"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=126794"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thevalleyledger.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=126794"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}