Langston to serve as president of National League for Nursing

By Erin Lucero
Office of Development, School of Medicine

Nancy F. Langston, Ph.D., professor and dean of Virginia Commonwealth University's School of Nursing, has begun a two-year term as president of the National League for Nursing. She had served as NLN’s president-elect since June 1997.

Langston assumed the presidency at the organization's biennial convention in June held in Miami Beach, Fla. As president, she will serve as chairman of the board of directors, as well as leader and spokesperson for the organization. She also will represent the NLN on national health-care advisory panels and at meetings of NLN chapters around the country.

During her term, she plans to establish the NLN Web site as an up-to-the-minute collection of the field of nursing education's best practices and scholarship. She envisions the Internet and virtual reality technology linking faculty who are geographically distant.

"Throughout the country, there are nursing researchers who are producing the latest scientific data and implementing it to improve both nursing education and patient care," said Langston. "We want to uncover their work and spotlight it via the Web, so that nurses all over the country can interact and benefit."

She also has begun to challenge nurses and nursing organizations to address the nature and type of practices that can be expected of nurses who are prepared with differing levels of education. Currently, a registered nurse may have received basic education in a two-year associate degree program, a three-year hospital-based program, a four-year university undergraduate program or a university graduate program.

"Up to now, educational programs have not worked to clarify how a nurse’s preparation should determine his or her role in the practice arena. As employers and patients begin to better understand how nurses’ work is knowledge based, it becomes clear that education does make a difference in terms of what a nurse is equipped to do."

Langston has been active in leadership positions with the NLN for more than two decades. She also currently serves as the president of the Virginia Association of Colleges of Nursing, an organization that represents the state’s public and private university-based nursing programs. Named one of Virginia’s outstanding nurses by the Virginia Nurses Association, she also is a member of the Fan Free Clinic Board and a member of Project Immunize Virginia.

The NLN is the nation’s leading accrediting body for nursing education programs and is the only national organization that represents nurses at all levels of education and practice. For over 100 years, the NLN has been dedicated to the advancement of quality nursing education.