Jane McCausland Kurz, ’74
Once a week from early December through early April in Lewes, DE, you can find Jane McCausland Kurz, ’74, BSN, MSN, Ph.D. voluntarily providing health assessments and tending to the aches, pains and injuries of the homeless population at a Day Clinic run through the Community Resource Center (CRC). After 49 years as a nurse, professor and administrator, including stints as an intensive care staff nurse in Philadelphia and Wilmington, DE., teaching roles at her alma mater (1982-86), as well as at Temple and LaSalle universities and administrative leadership roles at both institutions, it is her current outreach that is among her most meaningful work—a labor of love launched by the tragic passing of her son, Freddie, on June 21, 2022.
“The loss of my youngest son at age 37 to fentanyl poisoning was devastating,” Kurz said.
“I approached the CRC with the concept of opening a clinic because it was a way to channel my energies to those in need and to do my part to get the word out there. The problems are big. We need to address them.”
Kurz long had a concern for the unhoused and had been cooking meals and hosting clothing drives over the years, but following her retirement from full-time nursing in the summer of 2022, she knew there was another way to put her experience and empathy to work.
“With the homeless, everyone is focused on housing and food and clothing, but people are not paying attention to health,” she said. “If you don’t have housing, you don’t have health. The CRC offers this population many services – the ability to shower in a safe environment, access to a washer and dryer to freshen their clothes and of course food and shelter from 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. - but then they are forced back into the streets at the end of the day. They don’t want to go to the emergency room, because that might require an explanation to the police. They can’t say they are living in a tent because this is considered trespassing and is illegal.
They may have Medicaid, but no other insurance, and many health professionals won’t honor Medicaid. Many of the homeless are actually working, but they don’t make enough to cover rent. I said to myself, ‘Let me do my part to help them remain healthy so they can move forward’.”
Kurz brings bandages, compression stockings and compassion. She puts up posters, hands out slips of paper with the names of area physicians and clinics that will see them. She forms connections and breaks down barriers.
“It might take weeks until they actually come back and talk to me, but they eventually will,” she said. “I see that as a win-win. I wish to be accepted, but all I can do is be present until they are open to me and my potential services.”
Kurz was first introduced to this sense of service, she says, at Holy Family University, where she enrolled after tending to her mother – changing dressings and dispensing medication – while she battled breast cancer during Kurz’s early teenage years. When she returned to Holy Family as a professor, she assumed the role of instilling that same sense of responsibility in her students.
“Holy Family is where I tested out my teaching strategies,” she said. “I tried. I failed, I re-tried and created new networks. I worked with some great colleagues – both nursing and non-nursing. It was an exciting time. When I taught at Temple and LaSalle, every time I had a Holy Family University graduate in my class, I would just get excited,”
Kurz said, “and I would say ‘Oh, we’re from the same family!” I’d say, ‘This is so cool,’ and they probably thought I was crazy. But I do feel a connection with people from Holy Family. We have a common background. We were taught to be responsible – responsible for self, responsible for others, responsible for our community, and when you get bigger, in graduate programs, responsible for the world.”
That’s no small challenge, but it is one that Jane Kurz and all the nurses that she has taught and supervised, mentored and befriended from Northeast Philadelphia to the Ukraine, where she once traveled for a teaching assignment, are up for.
“It does not matter where you go,” she said. “The universal trait of nurses is that they are caring individuals. They have a high level of intelligence and are a very generous group.”
And so, Kurz continues to generously give of herself and from her incredible vault of experience and expertise, continuing to engage graduatelevel students synchronously through part-time teaching in the evening from her home. “You need to find your purpose in life,” Kurz said. “I don’t think I’m quite done yet. I love working with students. I love teaching. If you have the knowledge and the passion, you should be sharing it.”