WGU Alumni Podcast

From ER Leader to Florida ENA President: Distinguished Graduate Christie Jandora's Journey

• WGU Alumni Relations • Season 2 • Episode 12

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Christie Jandora, a 2024 Distinguished Graduate at WGU, is the Director of Emergency Trauma Services at Ascension, overseeing 500 associates across five Florida counties. She joins the WGU Alumni podcast to share her journey that has been marked by resilience, passion, and purpose. 

 On the latest episode, learn how Christie:

  • Plans to make an impact as the President-Elect of the Florida Emergency Nurses Association 
  • Leads multiple ERs, including a Level 1 trauma center and freestanding emergency departments 
  • Pursued nursing after losing both parents during her first semester of college 
  • Rose through nursing ranks—from LPN to master’s degree—while raising her children as a single parent 
  • Completed her master’s during COVID while working 50–60 hours a week 
  • And much, much more. 
Speaker 1:

Hey everybody, welcome back to the WGU alumni podcast. We're thrilled to have you joining us yet again. My name is Jeff Burton, with the alumni team here at WGU, and we have another interview with a fantastic graduate, one of our distinguished graduates from 2024, and that would be Christy Jandora. Christy is the director of emergency trauma and and Observation Services at Ascension and we look forward to catching up with her and hearing her story. Christy, welcome.

Speaker 2:

Hi, thank you for having me.

Speaker 1:

I'm excited for this interview because, in addition to your work at Ascension, I understand you started a new volunteer role is that correct? In your service, you're providing service to nurses in the state of Florida, so can you tell us a little bit about that?

Speaker 2:

That is correct. I have been a longtime member of the Emergency Nurses Association and so just recently I was elected to the president role, so I'm currently serving as the president-elect for the Florida Emergency Nurses Association. With that role I also do the government affairs co-chair, advocating for policy at a national level for emergency nurses.

Speaker 1:

Well, fantastic. How long is your term there?

Speaker 2:

It's a six-year term.

Speaker 1:

Oh, wow.

Speaker 2:

So it's a big commitment, but it's worthwhile work that I truly enjoy doing.

Speaker 1:

That's fantastic, and tell us a little bit about your role at Ascension. How many people do you oversee and give us a typical day-to-day.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, so I oversee multiple emergency departments. One is a level one trauma center. That's our big ER. I also have some freestanding ERs. An observation unit in our community outreach department was just added to my group of folks, so I think all in all I have between 450 and 500 associates that roll up underneath me. I have about eight direct reports, but within that umbrella there's quite a few folks scattered amongst five counties on the panhandle of Florida.

Speaker 1:

Wow. Well, I'm excited to get some life hacks from you. You're doing a lot and really want to just kind of get to know you a little bit better and what makes you tick, why you do what you do. But I first wanted to congratulate you on being named one of our distinguished graduates for 2024. Fantastic and very well deserved on your part, and just want to ask what this recognition means to you.

Speaker 2:

Thank you and I am truly humbled and honored to have this distinguished graduate award. It's such a great validation that the amount of personal and professional dedication you put into hiring your own education it's just a nice validation and stamp on that that you really are working hard to achieve your own personal goals and that it's recognized at that level with the college that you attended and truly enjoyed being part of.

Speaker 1:

Yeah well, we're thrilled to have you in our alumni ranks. You represent us so so well, and I wanted to start just kind of diving into your background and ask what attracted you to the health care space in the first place.

Speaker 2:

My journey started at a very young adult age. I actually thought I would go to medical school. That was my original thought. Unfortunately, tragedy hit my first semester in college and I lost both of my parents and I spent a lot of time in an ICU waiting room and I saw a lot of great, fantastic things in the nursing world and it motivated me to want to be a nurse and to be the nurse that I saw in others, but also be a better nurse than I saw in a very small, small group. So it's been a great journey. For me Definitely is one of those things where I think the Lord puts you where you need to be and helps guide you on your path, and here I sit today.

Speaker 1:

Well, that's great, and there's probably no way for you to really quantify how many individuals that your career and what you've done in nursing, how many people you've impacted Any way to kind of estimate that or to kind of think in those terms.

Speaker 2:

Gosh, I don't think I've ever been asked that question and so when you asked it it's really thinking about. It really is a lot of lives. When you work in the emergency room world, especially some of the big trauma centers like I work in currently, we could see upwards of 200, 300 people a day, and now I don't touch each one of those individually. But when you think of that broad of a spectrum over a 30-plus year career, it's probably a pretty high number of people I've interacted with.

Speaker 1:

Well, like you say, what a ripple effect, right, I mean, it's hard to quantify that. What would you say is the best thing about being a nurse?

Speaker 2:

I think it's the people Not only the people that you work with that are in a community that's like-minded and giving back and really helping people, in a community that's like-minded and giving back and really helping people, but it's the people you interact with every day the patients, the families, seeing people grow up In the pediatric population. You'll see some of the same chronic kids over and over and then 30 years later, you're watching them graduate college and start their own careers and it's just, it's humbling to see.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, wow. Well, I want to ask you a little bit about your educational journey. Tell us how you connected with WGU and what was your motivation or desire to go back and get a master's degree.

Speaker 2:

With nursing. You can start out with a one-year, a two-year, a three-year or a four-year degree and I took the long road so it is doable. For anybody out there that thinks it's not, it is. I started out in an LPN program, progressed through the RN program Years later, found myself as a single mother but decided I needed to work on my bachelor's.

Speaker 2:

So I did that and then as my career grew and I was promoted upwards it's highly encouraged that you expand your knowledge and that you get those master's degrees and really learn more of the business side of things that you don't learn as a nurse, more of the business side of things that you don't learn as a nurse.

Speaker 2:

And so when I really looked at programs, what would fit my lifestyle in a very busy career position as I was in, working 50, 60 hours a week and being a single mom I really looked at programs that catered to that, like that would work around that and say that you can still have a full-time job and be a full-time mom and do all of those things and still pursue higher education. And WGU offered that. It was a very robust program but very doable program with that kind of life and even the financial aspect of it and how you navigate paying for semester over semester while still trying to maintain your household, like it just was a fantastic program. I had colleagues that had gone through it and strongly recommended it and I did the program I don't want to say with ease, because it's not an easy program, in a sense of you do have to study, there is a lot of work to do, but it is an easier program to navigate life with.

Speaker 1:

What was the best thing about your experience at WGU?

Speaker 2:

I think it's two things. One is the instructors and the professors that I worked with. Every single one of them were encouraging and wanted you to succeed. If you struggled, they struggled with you and they helped you. You meet a lot of people, you get a lot of connections, you get a lot of support, just met a lot of really great people along the way that I feel like I will have in my life forever.

Speaker 1:

That's great. Now this season on the WG Alumni Podcast, we're tackling the theme of it's never too late. Obviously, our student population is filled with. Maybe we call them non-traditional students in the sense that they're not right out of high school and maybe they come back a little bit later in life, which sounds like your case from what you described a minute ago. Was there anything holding you back from going to school or any obstacles that you faced that made that more difficult?

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I really thought that I just am not going to have the time for that. I'm not going to have the time to go back to school. I don't know where I'm going to fit that into my busy life. But looking at this program, you see that it is and you're still skeptical of that your first semester. Like you know, it's ripping a Band-Aid off to register and take that plunge, but probably not even a couple of weeks into my first semester and I was like this is doable. I know you would never ask me, jess, but I am 50, a little over 50, if I'm being honest, and so it was a big step to say do I really want to go back to school at this stage in my life? And at that point in time, too, was also the start of COVID. So the whole world got turned upside down, and doing a full online program without even any in-person clinicals was terrifying but totally doable.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, well, that's great. Was there any unexpected bonus or surprise that came along during your experience that you didn't anticipate?

Speaker 2:

Several things come to mind, but just bringing up COVID when the whole world changed and shifted to more of an online platform that hadn't been there before, with everything from work to school to everything it's, I think WGU did a really good job of navigating that and adapting, as we went to easy to figure out the world of proctors online and mock projects that you would have done in the hospital that now you have to somewhat mock up and do online with an instructor, and we all just navigated that together and I think it's a testament to the power WGU has and the depth that they have to adapt and overcome when things arise.

Speaker 1:

I'm curious, Christy, if there was a moment that you knew it was never too late for you in terms of going back to school and pursuing your education.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think for me it was. I had attempted a different program a year or so prior to starting the WG program and it just wasn't a program that was conducive to a lifestyle of full-time work and full-time parenting, and so I knew early on that wasn't the program for me. But within my first few weeks of WGU and seeing how the curriculum set up and the support of the professors and your classmates, I knew early on that this was the program for me and that I would be successful with it.

Speaker 1:

That's great, kind of staying in the same space. Has there been a time in your life where you knew it wasn't too late to pursue a hobby, an interest or something that you wanted to tackle for some time?

Speaker 2:

I have to say I got real motivated with working on my master's degree and I at that point thought well, I could take on anything I can take on the world. If I can do this at 50, I can do anything. So for fun, I learned how to paddleboard and that was kind of my zen moments, if you will. Anytime I could get out on the water on a paddleboard and learn that balance and peaceful time Just great times for me, and so it's motivated me to do even more things. Where's the best place to go paddleboarding down there? We have lots of great spots on the bay or the intercoastal waterway. I haven't mastered the gulf yet. That's still a little too rocky for me.

Speaker 1:

Well, I love that. That's really cool, and cool that you've picked that up again recently. That's so cool to hear.

Speaker 2:

Yeah Said, you're really never too old to do anything if you put your mind to it.

Speaker 1:

Very true, Very true. I want to ask you, as you've had a successful career you've been successful in your education. Again, you're in a leadership role in multiple capacities I'm curious if you wouldn't mind sharing a few career or life hacks, things that you have learned along the way that maybe have been meaningful to you and helped you be very successful.

Speaker 2:

Finding your own stride and organizational skills are really key to keeping you on track, and that looks different for different people. My co-workers laugh because I'm a post-it note girl, so I have a post-it note board and as I complete tasks I throw the post-it note away and it's kind of reward and recognition to see it see a wall of post-it notes slowly disappear and then you add new ones up there and so that's one of my organizational skills. I'm a list keeper and a checkbox person so that works for me. So I just encourage people to find what works for them, to stay on task and stay organized, because to me that was the key to staying on top of my work and my master's program and also what's been the key to my success and my professional roles in my success and my professional roles.

Speaker 1:

Now I want to look forward over the next one to two years, as your hands are in a lot of different things. You're busy, you're active. Tell me about the next one to two years. What are some things that you hope to accomplish?

Speaker 2:

Oh goodness, I am seriously considering working on my doctorate because I had such a great experience getting my master's, so don't hold me to that. That will take me probably a little longer than two years. Also, in my current role here at work, we are building several freestanding ERs to add to our portfolio, so those will start coming online within the next six months. So about every six months we'll open another one. So that'll keep me pretty busy in my work life. So I'm excited about that to expand the care that we give across multiple communities that are underserved.

Speaker 2:

That's my professional stuff working on some legislative asks at the Senate and the House bill level, really advocating for workplace violence, especially on healthcare workers. That's a nationwide concern and a leading cause of burnout to healthcare workers and we need to protect our workforce. And then looking at some other safety things, since I do work in trauma too. If I can give a shameless plug here, there's a law that's very new that we're trying to get pushed. It's not law, we're trying to get it pushed through and passed. It's called Lulu's Law. It's an alert activation system for shark attacks along the Gulf waters so that if there is an attack you could get a quick alert similar to that of Code Silver, or a kidnapping to let people know, to get out of the water and to keep people safe. Shark attacks only happen once every 10 or 15 years, but they're devastating when they do.

Speaker 1:

Christy, we know that you're busy. From all that we've talked about, you're super active and we just want to say thank you for the time and thank you for being such an active member of our alumni really network throughout the country. I know there are a lot of people in healthcare that are listening and I'm sure they're intrigued by your message, by your status, by all that you're doing. If people wanted to reach out to you, are you on LinkedIn? Is there a place that they might be able to connect with you?

Speaker 2:

I am on LinkedIn, Christy Jandora. I'm in there in the WGU alumni group on LinkedIn as well.

Speaker 1:

This has been a great interview and we're proud of you and just want to say great job in all the endeavors, all the efforts that you're doing. And I'd love to turn this over to you kind of for a final word as we wrap the podcast so anything else that you'd like to add here today.

Speaker 2:

Oh, just thank you, jeff, thank you and all the alumni crew that have been so supportive and so complimentary, and I feel like I'm part of a family now that I will have forever and I just appreciate you all so much and I appreciate the honor you all have given me and let me participate in some of these things. It's I think it's really it's that support system that sets you all above the rest, and it's hard to put into words how meaningful it is.

Speaker 1:

Thank you for your kind words and all the best to you. Thanks, Christy.

Speaker 2:

Bye.