“A higher standard of training in a more academic environment”
When Mabel Hersey and Grace Fairley proposed the development of a graduate nurses program at McGill, it was a progressive idea for its time. Before 1919, when the University of British Columbia became the first university in Canada to establish a degree program in nursing, the only way to obtain nursing education was through a hospital training program. Hersey and Fairley were very familiar with this, being the nursing superintendents at the Royal Victoria Hospital and Alexandra Hospital respectively. In 1919, the two women led a small group of nurses in forming the Graduate Nurses’ Association of Montreal, where the idea of a department for graduate nurses was formed.
The time they were living in was one of great change. Canada was emerging from the aftermath of World War I, and the 1918 Flu Pandemic, known as the Spanish flu, had resulted in the deaths of tens of millions of people worldwide. The nursing profession was facing new challenges, and Hersey and Fairley knew first-hand that the demand for trained nurses exceeded the supply.
A nod to Florence Nightingale
In May of 1920, Hersey and Fairley presented their proposal for the graduate school to the board of McGill’s Medical Faculty and the Corporation of McGill University. They explained that establishing a graduate nurses training course was essential to meet the growing demand for trained nurses, and that “the centennial of the birth of Florence Nightingale could not be celebrated more fittingly than by the establishment of such a course.”
The proposal met with almost immediate approval, and on June 28, the Corporation—stating that “it was thought a matter of wisdom and foresight to establish a Department this year at McGill for the training of Graduate Nurses for teaching, administration work, public and social nursing”—approved the creation of the McGill School for Graduate Nurses to offer advanced training for nurses who had RN degrees.
Lucky thirteen
The first faculty members included newly appointed director Flora Shaw, and Dr. Maude Abbott, who would become world-renowned for her work in congenital heart diseases.
When the School officially opened on October 15, 1920, it offered two full-year courses: a Public Health Certificate course, and a Teaching and Supervision in Schools of Nursing course. There was also a four-month course on Public Health Nursing.
Fifteen students registered, and eventually, two dropped out. The lucky thirteen who graduated in May 1921 included students from Montreal and other parts of Canada, but also women who had come to Montreal from the United States, Ireland and Jamaica. One of the graduates, Anne Slattery, became the School’s Acting Director in 1927 after the sudden death of Flora Shaw.
The Quebec Provincial Red Cross Society provided financial support to the School of Graduate Nurses for its first three years as a gesture of appreciation to nurses who had served in World War I. At the end of this period, in 1923, the University assumed responsibility for the School’s operations.