Asmerom Ghirmai
B.S., cum laude, Nursing, 2023
Registered Nurse, Virginia Mason Hospital
“Being an Alfie Scholar is marching on an avenue towards success as it helps you to meet a family who can see your potential at your lowest and elevate you to participate as a civil leader so that you can reflect back to the community.”
Service & Work:
Deacon, Eritrean Community Church
Volunteer community church server
Seattle Central College African Students Association
Awards & Honors:
Member, Alpha Sigma Nu Jesuit Honor Society
Member, Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society
Alfie Scholars, Cohort 6, 2021–2023
Dean’s List, Seattle Central College
Washington State Opportunity Scholarship
Seattle Central Foundation Scholarship
Asmerom’s Story
I was born in Sudan in 1995 from Eritrean parents. After many years of refuge in Sudan (a neighboring country), my family and I went back to Eritrea as part of the resettlement program in 1998 while I was still a child. While I was a child a tragic accident happened in front of me that led me to dream of becoming a nurse. I saw drivers of collided cars bleeding; as a result the one passed away due to the lack of help. From that day I decided to be a nurse to rescue others' lives.
The town where I grew up has not enough schools. Even though my father did not get a chance to go to school, he knew the values of education very well, and he was always advising us that we need to concentrate on our education. He was advising us that it is through education, as the only option, that we can change ourselves and the societies that we are part of. My brother and I started school at the age of 6. I was very interested because I got the chance to go to school that my father couldn’t, but on top of that, I remember enjoying the things that my teachers taught me. I was serious about my education, and I finished my elementary through high school education in my city; although I started college I was forced to terminate my educational journey due to corrupted political agendas my country was obeying. The bad political treatments and situations made me flee to a neighboring country, Sudan, and leave my parents behind. After that, I had to leave Sudan as well because of its instability and made my way to the U.S. to seek better living conditions. I passed through several countries including Dubai, Brazil, Peru, Ecuador, Colombia, Panama, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, Guatemala and Mexico before arriving in America. The journey was in all methods of transportation, by plane, boat, buses, horse, and also on foot. It was life threatening and full of hardships with cultural and language barriers. In moving from country to country, I wondered what the word “home” even meant to other people, although in time I came to understand that I no longer belonged to one nation, that my worldview was now multicultural. After I arrived in America I was detained until my asylum paper was processed, and in my last hearing the judge reviewed my asylum and released me with his courage word.
The U.S. accepted me for who I am and the one glimpse of hope of fulfilling my dreams came to reality. I resumed my education and came to Seattle Central college to pursue my childhood dream of becoming a nurse. Acquiring successful time management skills was another challenge I faced as a student in the U.S. It was an aspect of college that I underestimated the significance of. As a full time worker, it was hard at first to keep track of my studies but because of the time management skills I developed, I managed to work as a driver for 34 hours a week while taking full time credits at college and still maintained a high GPA. I have come to the conclusion that the challenges I was facing were a factual pathway that will eventually direct me to my ultimate goals. I was excited to get admitted by one of the most highly ranked universities which is Seattle University.
My advice to those who have dreams in education is to keep working hard on their dream. Frankly, challenges will come along the way yet, if we challenge the challenges we become stronger and end up victorious. Although hard times come we have to remember why we started in the first place; our vision is our motivation. If we work hard and stay dedicated with patience, there is no doubt we will reach our goals.
Goals:
My name is Asmerom Ghirmai, I am from Eritrea that is located on the horn of Africa.
I have had a passion for the medical field since my early childhood. As I grew up in a country that has a shortage of health facilities, resulting in seeing people struggling and being a victim, I got motivated to study hard to become a professional nurse and rescue others' lives. I resumed my educational journey in America after I spent one year working and settling. I took my prerequisite classes at Seattle Central College and now I am at Seattle University working on my goals. My goal is to complete my nursing undergraduate degree at Seattle University, and afterwards I have a plan to work for Swedish hospital to fully gain nursing experiences. A couple years after my graduation I will have a dream to go back to where I came from and provide medical services to many patients. At the same time I also want to go back to school at some point to become a nurse practitioner. I will also need to be a model nurse and civility leader that can inspire others to be involved in working hard making changes in their environment.
On Civility:
Civility to me is respect or treating others as the way one needs to be treated. A civility leader is a leader who applies respect, showing courage when that is appropriate, being flexible and willing to listen and value others' opinions. Civility leaders must apply the three pillars of civility, which are consciousness, creativity and community.
Consciousness helps us to reflect the concept of emotional intelligence, fosters civility by escalating our understandings in our psychological triggers, emotional responses and overall well-being, and assists us to choose our words wisely and it impacts our actions accordingly.
Creativity enables us to visualize situations from all angles. By supporting consciousness and self-awareness creativity expands our perspective to provide operative problem-solving and moreover creativity opens our minds to a larger range of potentialities.
Community helps us to value other’s perspectives, reduce implicit racial bias and we gain collaborative skills.
Beside this a civil leader must also impact others by being an example. This could be by expressing good behaviors that impress others which also can be seen as a role model.
