Caleb Isom
Caleb Isom, a freshman from Plymouth, Indiana, says a work accident involving his father fuels his passion for nursing.
“When I was young, I wanted to be a doctor. But in 2012 my dad got fourth-degree burns on his foot, and he lost all of the toes on that foot in the steel mill where he works in Burns Harbor,” he says. “When we would visit him in the hospital, we never saw the doctors, but we always saw the nurses. I saw their dedication to the patients and how much they helped them, and I decided that’s what I want to do.
“I want to help others and give back in the same way that those nurses did. He’s now back working in the steel mill. He had a prosthesis for all of his toes, and he had to learn how to walk again. If you didn’t know his story, you wouldn’t now that he got injured. I want to do that for people and help pay back for how well my dad did.”
Isom says two factors led him to pick the Purdue School of Nursing, which was named a Center of Excellence by the National League for Nursing in 2017.
“One is the research that they offer here. I’m in the Honors College, so I will get the opportunity to do a lot of research even as an undergraduate,” he says. “And two: Bigger schools have bigger programs with great academics, but Purdue’s program has the academics and focuses on who the person is. A nurse is an advocate. They’re not just there to help bring a person from their worst state to their best state. They’re also there to talk with and work with the patient and say ‘this person needs this kind of care, and here’s why.’ That’s what I want to do.”
Isom hopes to eventually get a dual master’s degree or doctorate in both public health and nursing. He says his life goal in public health is to work as an epidemiologist at the Centers for Disease Control.
