During the spring semester, Decker School of Nursing undergraduate seniors presented community health assessment projects to UHS Home Care staff before Clinical Assistant Professor Maureen Daws, APRN, BC, took them on a field trip to partake in an annual Binghamton community tradition.
The students' adventure landed them at Saint Michael's Greek Catholic Church in Binghamton, NY, where they helped make pieroghis. It afforded these senior nursing students the opportunity to immerse themselves in a community-driven event. The local pieroghi sale sponsored by St. Michael's church has rooted itself and grown into an area-wide known festival of food consumption that is based for many in the Binghamton area on the religious observance of Lent. Lent calls for abstinence of meat consumption on Fridays each week throughout the Lenten season. Pieroghis are pockets of dough typically stuffed with cheese, cabbage, sauerkraut or a potato-based filling. Hand made and then cooked, pieroghis are sold by parishioners and volunteers to offset financial costs of the church while providing the community with a delicious, meat-free lunch or dinner.
Led by parish priest, Father Dutko, Decker School nursing students helped to meet a need of Binghamton residents who observe Lent and of those who just enjoy good food. Students worked side-by-side with elder church members who taught them to pinch filling inside of the dough pockets getting them ready for the deep fryer. Students' interactions with church members served to not only strengthen their understanding of a community tradition but also their understanding of and connection to the people and place where many will live and serve as future practicing RNs in local hospitals.
