Kenzie complained about the unreasonable workload suffered by science majors all through her time at SNC.

She graduated May 2009 and immediately started an intensive one-year B.S. in Nursing program designed for postgraduates with degrees in other fields and biology pre-requisite courses. I received this email from her at the end of that year.
From: MacKenzie Fenske [mailto:MacKenzie_Fenske@snceagles.sierranevada.edu] Sent: Wednesday, September 15, 2010 6:27 PM To: Suzanne Gollery Subject: Hi Suzanne! A thanks and a question! Hi Suzanne! I wanted to email you because I had a question for you. Additionally I wanted to update you on what I am doing so you can tell your students what they are capable of. I graduated with a bachelor's of science in nursing on the 14th of May. I moved down to Texas to be with my fiance in June. I passed Texas state boards on the 27th of July. Finally, I was offered a position at Children's Hospital of Dallas. After an 18 week internship I will be offered a full-time position on a surgical/trauma/orthopedic floor. As much as I disliked some aspects of my major choice in college, you did prepare me for last year and my future. So thanks! Anyways, as far as my question goes....I have two tests to take tomorrow and one of them is on medication calculations. Prior to this hospital I've not seen the units for grams written "gm." Isn't this wrong? I thought grams were written "g"? Thanks! Hope the knee is better! -MacKenzie

From: Suzanne Gollery Sent: Thu 9/16/2010 9:18 AM To: MacKenzie Fenske <MacKenzie_Fenske@snceagles.sierranevada.edu> Subject: RE: Hi Suzanne! A thanks and a question!

Kenzie, The gm abbreviation for grams is not so much wrong as just an older abbreviation, but it still is the standard in the medical field. Is there another medical term abbreviated g so that it was necessary to differentiate it from grams? Even if there isnt, it is not unusual that some fields use different nomenclature, abbreviations, or acronyms than others, although it is sometimes confusing. We just have to accommodate whatever culture were working in. Glad to hear you are achieving your goals! I enjoyed living in Texas and hope you do too. Texans are very genuine and it is easy to develop meaningful friendships, as long as you agree that Texas is a great place to be (if you dont like Texas, youre a Damn Yankee). I know that sometimes you felt like science students at SNC had to work unreasonably hard in comparison to students in some other majors, but the science faculty have been at top institutions and we know what being adequately prepared looks like, which is why we hold SNC students to the standards that we do. Its much better to have alumni say thanks than to have them say why didnt you do a better job of preparing me? Take care and keep in touch! Suzanne