This weekend the nursing department is hosting two days of festivities to celebrate the success and leadership that the program has brought to campus since its creation 50 years ago.

The department admits 40 students each fall semester and 40 in the winter. 

Currently, there are 193 nursing students on campus and none of them will struggle to find employment.

“The only way someone with this degree won’t get a job is if they choose not to apply,” Associate Dean and Director of Nursing Kristi Robinia said.

The festivities begin with a symposium exploring autoimmune diseases at 1:00 p.m. on Friday in Reynolds Recital Hall. In conjunction with Race for Relapsing Polychondritis (RP), the Allegheny Health Network Autoimmunity Institute (AHN), and the U.P. Health System (UPHS), three experts will take the stage to speak on the topic.

Dr. Susan Manzi, Dr. Joseph Ahearn and Emily Somers, an epidemiologist from the University of Michigan will be speaking about autoimmune diseases such as AIDS, multiple sclerosis and Chron’s Disease and how they spread. The symposium is open to the public and the speakers will be fielding questions, Robinia said.

“Most people are affected by or know someone affected by these diseases,” Robinia said. “This event will appeal to them.”

Following the symposium, the program will be in the homecoming parade. They will be easy to find as a representative from Race for RP will be following them in a racecar.

The festivities will wrap up at 9 a.m. Saturday with a public breakfast and open house in West Science, displaying the program’s state of the art simulation center, opened in 2017 and other equipment. 

“A lot of programs don’t have this. [The simulation center] mimics a real person, with a heartbeat, blood pressure—it allows our students to train as close to the real thing as possible,” Robinia said.