Simulation

Simulation
By Dr. Ben S. Malayang III, President

(Remarks delivered during the inauguration of the Simulation Laboratory and Resource Center on September 25, 2014, with representatives from the American Schools and Hospitals Abroad-United States Agency for International Development and the United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia.)

Our world today is no longer the same as the world that we have always been familiar with.  When before, the concepts of countries and states were that there are people with common aspirations living in a bounded territory, we now have people defining themselves a state with no defined territory.

When before, the concept of morals was to uphold the sanctity of individuals, today it is to readily kill individuals to uphold the sanctity of group identity. When before, civility was defined as tact, violence now readily overwhelms diplomacy.

When before, the concept of national advancement is to achieve peace, it seems today it is capacity to wage war.

When before, we were comforted with the regularity and rhythmic cycles of seasons, today we face so much uncertainty over our climate and on our collective capacities for survival.

Today, we face new challenges to our health. Old diseases are coming back, with more intense virulence. New ones are emerging. Changing patterns of moisture distribution and temperatures are creating new epidemiological drivers. Health care today demands new pedagogies of health care education.

Today's two challenges to health care education, I believe, are to build relevant competence and high confidence to decisively intervene when health care situations are dire and difficult. Our world is rife with crises and calamities, both human-made and natural. We can anticipate that much of health care will be under severe conditions and constraints.

These health education and teaching simulation laboratories we are inaugurating today, are intended to boost building competence and confidence among nursing students and students of other health education fields.

For a student nurse and students of other health care professions, competence is about having an acute mastery of theory combined with the capacity for critical appreciation of evidence. Competence allows for knowing what to do under different and diverse circumstances.

Confidence, meanwhile, is about having an acute mastery of procedures combined with a capacity for critical appreciation of divergent situations. Confidence allows for decisively being able to do what must be done across varying situations.

These simulation laboratories should be useful tools and facilities to understand theories and appreciate evidence. They could be useful in mastering procedures across variant situations. And do, they should be useful in building competence and confidence among our nursing students and students of other health care professions.

We thank the people of the United States through the American Schools and Hospitals Abroad (ASHA) Program of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), for the gift of these laboratories. We thank the United Board for Christian Higher Education in Asia (UBCHEA), for facilitating these gifts.

In return, we commit to use these to advance nursing and health care education in our country.

News story: Simulation Lab Supported by $500K ASHA Grant Inaugurated