Students honored for Scholarly Project excellence

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) students Zachary Taylor and Emily Gorzycki were named recipients of the Sandra R. Edwardson Award for Excellence in Post-Baccalaureate DNP Scholarly Project. The award, named for the school’s first DNP program director, is awarded to students who demonstrate leadership in an area of nursing practice and whose DNP project exemplifies the ideals of DNP scholarship.

“I have had many DNP advisees over the past 15 years and these two students stand out as the most intelligent and hardworking with passion towards improving the lives of African Americans as it relates to stroke,” wrote Niloufar Niakosari Hadidi, PhD, APRN, CNS-BC, FAHA, in her nomination letter. “Their integrity in following up and persevering is exemplar.”

Both Taylor and Gorzycki were students in the adult/gerontological clinical nurse specialist specialty who graduated this spring. Gorzycki’s DNP Scholarly Project was Web-Based, Community-Engaged and Tailored Hypertension Education for African Americans. Taylor’s DNP Scholarly Project was Community-Centered Education to Prevent Diabetes & Stroke in Twin Cities African American Communities: A Quality Improvement Project.

The DNP Scholarly Project represents a synthesis of a student’s work in the DNP program by addressing a complex practice or clinical problem within the student’s field of expertise. Students propose an evidence-based change to address that problem for a significant population, use doctoral-level leadership skills to implement and evaluate the efficacy of the practice change, and evaluate the outcomes of the change.