Remembering My Post-Doctoral Kennedy Fellowship in Medical Ethics, at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 1976–1977

From Nursing Ethics, 1880s to the Present (p. 351-352)
Used by permission 2024 © Marsha Fowler
Chapter 11 Notes

While waiting for the elevator at the University of California at San Francisco School of Nursing, where I was a faculty member teaching Psych‑Mental Health Nursing, a colleague noticed a flyer about the Kennedy Fellowship in Medical Eth- ics and brought it to me, saying, “This might interest you.” I applied immediately after talking with the dean and the department chair. Over 200 people had applied that year; 12 were flown to Washington, DC for an interview, and they (The Joseph P. Kennedy, Jr. Foundation) awarded four fellowships. I was one of the recipients. The minute I heard that I had a fellowship, I organized my housing and got a season ticket to the Boston Symphony Orchestra. My Fellowship was to Harvard Univer- sity, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The summer preceding the fellowship, I had met Mila Aroskar at the Kennedy summer intensive session on bioethics at Georgetown University in Washington, DC. She, too, was going to Harvard on a Kennedy Fellowship. The foundation awarded four fellowships a year, two to nurses, and two to physicians. The fel- lowship could be taken at either Harvard University or at Georgetown University where the fellows would engage in studies, their own research in bioethics, and more. We talked with a physician who previously had been at Harvard as a Ken- nedy fellow. This conversation helped us organize our course of study.

Being There

Mila and I met with William Curran, an attorney on the faculty of the School of Public Health, who ran the Kennedy Fellowship Program with Drs. Stanley Reiser and Arthur Dyck. All of Harvard was open to us. We took courses in the Medical School, Law School, Philosophy department, School of Public Health, and the Di- vinity School. We were also on the Ethics Committee at Children’s Hospital. It was a new and emerging field and this was medical ethics in action (later to become biomedical ethics, then bioethics, but not just yet).

It was all wonderful, but something was missing in terms of nursing. Over lunch, I said to Mila, “We need something to pull all this knowledge together. We need structure. Let’s write a book.” Mila’s response was, “Anne! We don’t know enough to write a book.” A long discussion ensued and we did write a book. As I said then, we are not writing the great American novel, but a basic textbook for nurses.

One Problem

A problem arose one day and William Curran asked me to come to his office. Mrs. Eunice Kennedy Shriver, head of the Kennedy Foundation, had called and wanted the fellows to focus their studies on mental retardation or what is now

called developmental disability. I was upset by the idea of dropping everything so that the funding would continue and I made this very clear. Another faculty member in the program said to me, “Anne, think of the nurses in the future who want to study in this program.” I shot back, “I am.” Mila and I were the first nurse educators to be Kennedy fellows as it had only been open to medical doctors. As I left Bill Curran’s office, he asked what I planned to do. I said I would let him know after I thought about it.

The next day I wrote a Progress Report with three sections: (a) statement of my intent and the goals in my application for the fellowship, (b) my work accom- plished to date according to those goals, and (c) my work to accomplish by end of fellowship according to those goals. I gave my Progress Report to Bill Curran’s secretary, saying, “No word is to be changed before he mails it to Mrs. Shriver.” Bill Curran asked Mila to write a Progress Report, then he sent them both off and that was the end of that.

Some Final Words

The Kennedy Foundation had a huge impact on the development of bioethics as a field of study and a clinical reality. I am grateful that I was awarded a Kennedy Post Doc Fellowship. That experience, and the career it led to, enriched my life and provided me with a way to help students and practicing clinical nurses to cope with bioethical issues they confront. I am now going on 93 years old, and I wonder daily what the future bioethical issues will be. I suspect I cannot even imagine!