In the field of nursing, Flora Madeline Shaw is considered a pioneer in both education and the advancement of the profession. She held many roles in nursing and education before eventually accepting the directorship of McGill’s new School for Graduate Nurses in 1920.
In 1894, at the age of 30, she enrolled in the nursing school of the Montreal General Hospital, which had been established four years earlier by Gertrude Livingstone, who was the school’s superintendent. After graduating in 1896, Shaw became Livingstone’s second assistant. In 1904, she moved to New York City to attend Teachers’ College at Columbia University. She eventually returned to the Montreal General to start a new program designed to provide instruction for nursing students.
In 1908, as a representative of the Montreal General’s alumni association, Shaw attended the first meeting of the Canadian National Association of Trained Nurses (CNATN), an organization that would eventually become the Canadian Nurses Association. Shaw was named the CNATN’s first treasurer. Not long after that, she contracted tuberculosis and had to stop working for a period of time.
Shaw continued to advocate for the profession and after serving on a committee to promote university education for nurses in 1920 she was offered the directorship of the new McGill School for Graduate Nurses, which had recently been established to offer advanced training for nurses who had already earned their RN degrees. Shaw not only assumed administrative responsibility for the School but she taught most of the nursing courses herself. Under her leadership, the School worked with the Association of Registered Nurses of the Province of Quebec (ARNPQ) to offer extension courses to working nurses. Shaw was also instrumental in passing amendments in 1925 to improve standards of nursing and nursing education in Quebec.
In 1926, Shaw was named head of the Canadian Nurses Association. In that role, she attended a conference of the International Council of Nurses in Geneva in August, 1927. She became ill on her return home and was hospitalized in Liverpool where she died. Later that year, the American Journal of Nursing mentioned her death in its editorials section. “Not only was Miss Shaw greatly loved in her own country, she was honored in all that knew her.”
In honour of Shaw’s contribution to the School of Nursing, the Board of Governors of McGill University implemented the Flora Madeline Shaw Professor of Nursing Chair in 1958.