[Congressional Record Volume 152, Number 125 (Friday, September 29, 2006)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1921]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




 RECOGNIZING VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF NURSING AND GODCHAUX HALL

                                 ______
                                 

                            HON. JIM COOPER

                              of tennessee

                    in the house of representatives

                       Friday, September 29, 2006

  Mr. COOPER. Mr. Speaker, I rise today to recognize the many 
contributions of Vanderbilt University School of Nursing and its 
historic Godchaux Hall. Some of Nashville's most talented health care 
professionals, educators and students will gather today to celebrate a 
place ``where tradition meets innovation,'' the newly renovated 
Godchaux Hall.
  Godchaux Hall was built in 1925 as the dormitory for the 100 students 
and faculty of the Vanderbilt nursing program. It included classrooms, 
laboratory space and a library. Since then, it has undergone several 
name changes and renovations, but last year, Vanderbilt University 
School of Nursing was awarded a grant from the National Institutes of 
Health (NIH) to improve the space for the first time in thirty years.
  Today, Godchaux Hall is a truly innovative place where students from 
all over the world come to earn advanced nursing degrees and learn the 
skills they need to care for patients as nurses. An advanced 9-bed 
``Intervention Lab'' provides a simulated hospital environment and 
includes state-of-the-art computer equipment, ``Sim Man,'' to replicate 
a human patient. New behavioral labs create space for nursing 
researchers to work with human subjects outside the laboratory. The 
increased space also allows Vanderbilt to expand its relationship with 
community partners like Fisk and Lipscomb Universities whose students 
can earn Bachelor degrees at Vanderbilt's Godchaux Hall.
  The improved learning space at Godchaux Hall will give Vanderbilt the 
ability to continue its long tradition of excellence in nursing 
education. I commend Dean Colleen Conway-Welch for her leadership and 
Vanderbilt University School of Nursing for its achievements in 
innovation and education. One of the most significant outcomes of 
today's ribbon-cutting is that it will allow Nashville to combat the 
nursing shortage our nation faces and continue to provide the best in 
health care to patients from across Middle Tennessee.

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