Nursing fellow aids South Africa

Vernice Ferguson knows the world of separatism and inequality well. Perhaps it is for this reason that she is so dedicated to working for a more harmonious society. Ferguson, current president of the International Society of Nurses in Cancer Care, was recently given the opportunity to travel to South Africa as a visiting associate professor at the country's University of the Northwest. When she is not traveling the world, Ferguson serves as a senior fellow in cultural diversity at the School of Nursing. Ferguson took on this position in 1993, when then-Interim University President Claire Fagin felt the Nursing School should hire a person to dedicate time and energy to dealing with issues of cultural diversity. Nursing Dean Norma Lang said Ferguson was chosen on the basis of her "legendary expertise and contributions to nursing and health care." Ferguson served for more than 12 years as nurse leader for the Department of Veterans Affairs -- the largest organized nursing service in the world. She said she was first invited to tour South Africa three years ago, but that she intentionally delayed the trip until last summer. "I didn't want to go until after the elections and the rejection of the apartheid government," Ferguson explained. "I feared for my personal safety, much the way you would in a big city." Ferguson left for her nine-week trip last August, spending three weeks at the University of the Northwest and then traveling around the country visiting squatter camps, townships, homes and community clinics. "The whole works," she said. Ferguson said she found the trip both exhilarating and sobering. "The land was beautiful -- green, with lots of foliage -- but at the same time it was disturbing to see the vast needs for all kinds of resources," she said. "The 'new' South Africa could be a land of opportunity, but it is fraught with the difficulty of the need for resources to catch up." She added that though South Africa is a democratic state now, there is still an ongoing effort to make reparations for the years of apartheid rule. "We would drive by huge rolling farms with lots of open space and then come to a squatter camp and see people almost piled up on top of each other," she said. Ferguson added that during the apartheid era, eight times as much money was spent on the education of white children as on that of black children. Therefore when she arrived at the University of the Northwest -- an exclusively black school -- Ferguson said she found limited books and instructional aids and a "burning need for these resources." Ferguson added that though she recognized major inadequacies in health care, education and job availability, she also witnessed a "sense of hopefulness in terms of all groups of people working together to achieve harmony." And she said she has nothing but the highest praise for the nurses she worked with while there -- women and men from all four cultural groups in South Africa. "I got to hear their songs of joys and feel the sobering sense of what the future holds for them," Ferguson said. Since her return, she has appealed to colleagues, friends and book publishers to donate books about health issues to send to the University of the Northwest. She is also contributing books and tapes directed toward children. "I'm hoping it will be a sort of a bright Christmas for them," she said. Ferguson went on to say that the trip changed her world view. "I'd like to return [to South Africa] eventually, just not for another three to five years," she said. "I'd rather wait to return until I know there will have been some improvements." Ferguson also said there is a distinct parallel between the situation in South Africa and the situation in the United States. "There is a need for common ground both here and there," she said. "We need to bridge gaps between all sorts of relationships -- rich versus poor, black versus white, male versus female." Ferguson added that she feels the one ground rule in all relationships is respect for one another. "When you get to the bottom line, despite the minor differences, we are more alike than different," she said. "We have to constantly aspire to assure everyone the opportunity to reach one's potential in a free society."