Story and photo by James Coburn, Staff Writer
Amy Spiva, BSN, RN serves as the Elementary School Nurse for Stillwater Public Schools, but her role expands beyond that experience.
“Stillwater has six elementary sites and so there’s only one licensed nurse for those six elementary schools,” Spiva said. “We are very lucky to have Health Assistants at every site. I train, help manage, and prepare for known and unknown health needs, and the daily medical tasks that the Health Assistants can help carry out for me since I’m not able to be at every site all day.” (story continued below)
Spiva received her Associates Degree from Northern Oklahoma College in Tonkawa, and her Bachelor’s Degree from Panhandle State University in Goodwell.
She said her duties also include creating healthcare plans for SPS elementary students.
“I create individualized healthcare plans for students who have health needs that may or may not need to be managed or intervened upon while they’re at school every day,” she said. “We work with parents and physicians to create plans for students that inform staff of health concerns and how to respond in the event they should occur at school.”
Spiva said they train for various health concerns as well as chronic health conditions, which impact students who may need to take medication every day.
“A big one is diabetes,” she said. “It’s a major health condition that unfortunately affects more and more children every year and must be managed while at school. We do a lot of diabetic training as well as other emergent type healthcare needs and how to respond to those.”
Spiva also oversees her school district’s immunization compliance.
“We make sure that all of our immunizations are compliant according to the state regulations,” she said. “Being available for health assistants and students, traveling amongst the sites as needed for things that come up, medication administration, overseeing compliance, making sure that we’re following policy and school law, and that we are administering our medications correctly to our students that need them every day is a large portion of my role. Another key piece of my role is connecting families to health care services, communicating with providers, and teaching students as well as their families about various health concerns.”
After graduating college, Spiva worked from 2008 to 2011 as a Labor and Delivery nurse for Hillcrest Hospital in Cushing before coming to Stillwater, which has both an elementary and secondary nurse positions.
Spiva, a Ripley native, said she enjoys working as a school nurse.
“It’s not really the same thing every day,” she said. “I enjoy helping our kiddos be successful at school; they need to feel good and be healthy,” she said. “When we are able to identify things that we can help with or needs that can be met for them to be successful, that’s pretty rewarding.”
Spiva said the health and well-being of students is a priority for her and the school district.
“Stillwater does an excellent job at maintaining health policies that are in accordance with school law, but also when we see things in nursing practice that need to be addressed, they do an excellent job of helping us create policies that give us great boundaries to work within to keep our students safe,” she said. “We have planned for various stock medications in the event of unexpected health emergencies, or life-threatening situations. Stillwater Schools is incredibly supportive in giving us the tools that we need to keep all of our students safe.”
Spiva said she knew early on she wanted to become a nurse.
“In high school, I thought I wanted to be a nurse,” she said. “That was always kind of a draw for me. The medical field was intriguing to me.”
Spiva said her desire to become a nurse was strengthened by two life expe
“I started college and then took a break for a couple of years,” she said. “And, then as a young mother, I had two experiences when I had each of my children. And, one was a good experience and one was not a good experience. And, I think that good experience gave me that passion, that drive, to be that nurse, to be that person that can give other mothers and other patients positive experiences when they are in those situations where they need their healthcare needs met. I wanted to be that person that could care for them well.”
Spiva and her husband, Sean, have been married for 24 years, and have four children.
“We have four amazing kids, and we have made our home in the very area we both grew up in,” she said.
