“If I Am Ill May God Save Me From Being Nursed by the Ideal Nurse That Report Sets Up”: The DebatNursing Education, 1917-1925

Abstract

Contemporary struggles in nursing education, including debates on jurisdiction over program approval, competency-based education, and curricula, are not new conversations amongst nurse leaders. Discussions on these very topics, spanning international borders, occurred between 1917 and 1925, as American nurse leaders looked to extend their influence over nursing education throughout the world. Elisabeth Crowell, an American nurse who was stationed in France with the Rockefeller Foundation’s (RF) Commission for the Prevention of Tuberculosis in France (CPTF), worked towards improving nursing education in areas of France in 1917, however, similar changes to nursing education made by American nurse leaders working in the US at this same time, led to conflict over the “proper” method of improving nursing education worldwide. This paper examines changes to nursing education during the early 20th century and explores the conflict and tensions that then existed regarding the setting of one, single international standard in nursing education.