Editor:

In 2013, then-Representative Liias abandoned the bill we had introduced in the State Legislature in 2011 to protect the health, safety, and very lives, of vulnerable school age children.  It wasn’t until 2017 that this critical bill would be signed into law by Gov. Inslee.

I am a registered nurse. Sometimes in life the lift gets heavy but you don’t quit, you don’t walk away. Instead you lean in. Nurses don’t ask for the easy assignment. Every patient’s life, every child’s life is important and we work until the job is done.

School nurses care for children with physical and mental disabilities too numerous to list. 

Unlike nurses working in hospitals and health clinics nurses working in the school setting are often supervised by classroom teachers who return to school and get an administrative certificate.  They can then supervise nurses, school psychologists, physical therapists, etc. This is “legal” if they limit their supervision to the unlicensed practice of those who are licensed (do they show up to work on time). Unlicensed supervisors cannot, it is illegal, to direct the licensed practice of a nurse. If you are not a doctor you don’t practice medicine; if you are not a dentist you don’t practice dentistry; and if you are not a nurse, you don’t practice nursing. 

Unlicensed supervisors often attempt to direct a nurse to check with them first before administering a life-saving Epipen, when to call 911, when to give insulin. They direct nurses to administer a second dose of a mood-altering medication intended to “calm” a student to make him/her more “manageable” in the classroom when only one dose is prescribed — all illegal. Let me assure you that nurses, hopefully all, would never agree to do this. But, I will also tell you that nurses may be “punished”/suffer harassment by their supervisors for not being “ a team player” if they refuse. 

Between 2008 – 2014 two students in Washington state, that I am aware of, died while in the custody of school personnel. School liability insurance stepped in and mitigated these tragic events to keep them out of the public eye. 

In 2008, Nick Harper, an Everett attorney, helped me write a resolution challenging this practice. Richard Wright, chairman of the Democrat 21st Legislative District, moved it forward.  I was introduced to Marko Liias, who had plans to run for state representative. We discussed the issue and he agreed that if elected state representative for the 21st L.D. he would champion this effort to protect our students and end this dangerous practice in our schools. 

In 2009 Rep Liias had his legal staff help me write the proposed legislation. For two years Marko sponsored the bill and appeared to be working on behalf of Washington children. Getting the bill passed was very difficult. The Washington State School Administrators Association vigorously opposed it. They saw the bill as a threat to their power to control everything under the school house roof.

In 2013 I learned our bill would not get a hearing. Kurt, Marko’s admin sssistant, told me Marko had not “dropped” the bill — which is the process for introducing a bill for consideration in the legislature — and that was the reason. He said Marko forgot and that “he [Marko] was very busy working on other issues,” but he would call me. Marko never called. He walked away without a word and abandoned the bill and Washington’s school-age children. This was the man whom I had worked with to initially get elected to public office, then re-elected; worked on fundraisers, had coffee with, recorded a RoboCall, phone banking, contributed financially, and as Precinct Committee Officer for Edmonds 35 distributed campaign literature — on which I was pictured with Marko — to more than 1,000 homes twice.

As of 2013, I have never heard from Sen. Liias except to get mass distribution emails asking for donations to his latest campaign to further his political ambitions.  

It took eight years but in 2017, with the help and support of physicians, the Washington State Nurses Association, the Washington State School Nurses Association, the Washington State Epilepsy and Diabetes Associations, the Washington State Education Association, the Nursing Care Quality Assurance Commission, the Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction and parents, the bill finally met with success. Many supporters and State  Rep. Larry Springer, the bill’s sponsor, stood next to me as Gov. Inslee signed the bill into law. Substitute House Bill 1346.  Absent Senator Liias.  

We need a Lt Governor of integrity, with demonstrated strong leadership, committed to all constituents. One with fortitude who won’t fold and abandon the effort when the going gets tough. 

I close with the words of James Baldwin:

“For these are all our children.

We will all profit by — or pay for — 

whatever they become”

Theresa Campa Hutchison, R.N., M.Ed.
Edmonds