Nurses are natural teachers :
Alumnus shares life experience

Ken Simek is soft-spoken, yet keenly focused. In conversation, he listens intently; when observing, he doesn’t miss a detail. Such qualities serve Simek well not only as an emergency room nurse at St. Clare’s Hospital in Schenectady, but also as a clinical instructor in the Practical Nursing (PN) program at the Capital Region Career & Technical School. 

Simek also can relate to his PN students as an alumnus of two Career & Tech programs. He completed Building Trades as a Linton High School senior in 1984 and returned to Career & Tech to complete the PN for Adult Students program in 1996. In the years between, Simek’s life was anything but ordinary, providing him with experiences that impart dimension to his teaching and perspective for his students.

“I was always interested in nursing, but when I graduated from high school, I was on the wild side and had different priorities,” Simek related. He joined the U.S. Marine Corps “to get away from the city and club scene and gain some structure,” serving in North Carolina, Okinawa and California from 1984-89. After the military, Simek tapped his Career & Tech education in construction, framing houses and working in masonry. 

After three years, he changed careers again, working as a technician and quality control inspector at Coleco/SLM International in Amsterdam. In 1995, Simek accepted a promotion to supervisor and relocated when the toy and fitness equipment manufacturer closed shop and moved south. He lasted six months in the North Carolina heat.

“That was when I decided to return to the Capital Area and go back to school for nursing,” he said. Just two weeks before the beginning of class, Simek enrolled in the PN program for Adult Students, where he excelled. In fact, he achieved perfect classroom attendance and was never late, despite seriously injuring his hand in a snowblower and having to drive standard-shift left-handed each day from his home in Gloversville. He did have to make up some on-site clinical time, however, when fresh stitches kept him out of any healthcare environment for a few days.

Simek, it seems, can’t stay away from the hospital; to work, that is. In eight years as a nurse, first at Nathan Littauer Extended Care Facility and Hospital in Gloversville, and then at Albany Medical Center Hospital and St. Clare’s, he has missed just three days of work. And he hasn’t stopped learning and growing professionally. Simek earned an associate’s degree through the Registered Nursing (RN) program at Fulton Montgomery Community College (FMCC) and in 2000, he successfully tested for his New York State RN license. He is currently working toward a Bachelor of Science in Nursing through SUNY Plattsburgh’s satellite program at FMCC.

Nurses, according Simek, are “always learning and always teaching, and the best teachers have on-the-job experience that enables them to share the wisdom behind the method.” Simek makes such connections daily with his own students, according to Career & Tech Health Careers Coordinator Paula Negri, his supervisor and one of his former PN teachers. “As a student, Ken was a critical thinker who constantly challenged his teachers about topics being taught or questions on exams,” she noted. “Yet Ken was so diplomatic and such a conscientious student, that he inspired everyone in his class. He now tries to instill such qualities in his own students.”