UPEI nursing faculty and students present at regional nursing schools conference
Faculty and students in the UPEI Faculty of Nursing collaborated recently to present at the 2025 Atlantic Regional Canadian Association of Schools of Nursing (ARCASN) Conference in Saint John, NB.
The theme of the conference was “Fostering Resilience: Supporting Students, Nurses, and Educators in Nursing.”
The presentation, titled “Art-Based Pedagogy: An Ethics Assignment,” showcased how nursing students at UPEI explored complex ethical concepts through original artistic works, including songs, poetry, sculpture, and visual art. Students reflected on their personal experiences within the health-care system through poetry and music, while others used art to process moral distress, burnout, and resilience.
This research project began as one of four assignment options offered in NURS 3030: Issues in Nursing. Sixty-two out of 89 students chose this creative path. Ashton Dougan, Assistant Professor, Faculty of Nursing, and PhD candidate, who explores simulation and creative pedagogy in nursing education in her research, designed the original ethics assignment for the course.
“At the end of the term, Ashton transformed her classroom into an art gallery space and brought in other artistic faculty members to act as graders,” said second-year accelerated nursing student Marie-Pier Thibault-Messier, who was one of the presenters. “There was something really special about being in that room; we were all moved by each other's work, and it brought a level of group unity that I haven’t seen in a class setting before. The response was so meaningful that 14 students have since committed to co-authoring a scholarly paper about the project!”
Presenting the project at the conference, along with Dougan and Thibault-Messier, were Kevin Ryan, Clinical Nursing Instructor, who joined the project as an independent grader for the assignment, and Scott Davis, third-year nursing student, who wrote an original song titled “Healing Hands” that was played at the conference.
