Marlene Thompson, MS, a 2018 graduate of the Psychiatric/Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (PMHNP) program, graciously shared with us her summer visit to Japan and her trip to Tokyo’s Soka University.
“This summer I travelled to Japan in celebration of completing my MSN at UCSF. During this trip, Ms. Yumi Oshida (a professor of nursing at Tokyo’s Soka University) graciously invited me to visit with professors and students of Soka University’s School of Nursing, which has been involved in collaborative educational exchanges with UCSF since 2014. This visit was a highlight of my trip.
Several of the Soka students and alumni I met had participated in global training courses at UCSF, and expressed great appreciation for what they learned while visiting UCSF and from visiting UCSF SON professors. The students gave me a private tour of their campus and offered demonstrations of their nursing curriculum. Then we sat down for a roundtable discussion concerning the nursing role in our respective countries, global sociopolitical challenges and our individual plans for addressing health inequities.
Finally, we went to a sushi dinner, where we shared stories, learned more about each other’s culture and laughed over sake toasts. Professors Dr. Satoshi Sasaki and Yumi Oshida, the nursing faculty and the nursing students made me feel welcomed and valued as a UCSF ambassador. Moreover, I witnessed firsthand the dedication, thoughtfulness, compassion and generosity of all at Soka University. The trip was an honor, and I look forward to hosting any of my new Japanese friends in San Francisco during their next visit to UCSF.
Soka University Nursing School’s spirit of academic rigor and clinical excellence make the program a natural sister program to that of UCSF. Maintaining a relationship between the two schools will prove beneficial to students of both programs in years to come.”
(Photo: 2018 PMHNP MS graduate Marlene Thompson, 3rd from the right, with students and faculty of Soka University, Tokyo, Japan.)