ACLS INSTRUCTOR HIGHLIGHT JENNA K., BSN, RN, CEN, CPEN
We are excited to put the spotlight on Jenna Kennally, BSN, RN, CEN, CPEN and one of our beloved ACLS Instructors. Learn more about Jenna’s patient care approach and life-long commitment to learning and helping others.
1. Jenna's Medical Career Experience and Current Position:
Jenna recently landed her dream job as an emergency transport nurse at Boston Children's Hospital. While she has enjoyed working with critical care patients, she could always picture herself as a transport nurse. She recognizes the opportunities working with children in this capacity are few and far between and relishes the new experiences and nursing skills she will learn compared to her emergency room experience. Previously as an emergency room charge nurse at South Shore Hospital and Metro West Medical Center, Jenna had addressed many critical care patient cases, trained other staff and student nurses, and even triaged patients in the hospital lobby. Though she enjoyed the emergency room nurse role with its controlled chaos and critical thinking, when the new opportunity arose, she knew she needed to go for it! As an emergency transport nurse assisting in inter-facility hospital transfers of ICU patients in the New England region, Jenna has broadened and advanced her scope of practice and embraces the educational opportunities, highlighting the lifelong learning process in nursing. During the transport of the pediatric patient, typically by ambulance, though Boston MedFlight is utilized when the circumstance is warranted, Jenna is part of a team of 2 nurses along with an EMT or paramedic who safeguards the patient between hospital facilities.
2. Is there an aspect of your current position that surprised you?
Jenna shared that it's very special just to see how grateful people are across the board, and there is a level of connection as you are in a transport with the patient and family and feel like getting to know them during that experience. She also loves the opportunity to follow the patient throughout their stay at Boston Children's, so she and her colleagues often visit children during downtime. Previously as an ER nurse, Jenna didn't always see the continuity of people and their health journey and didn't benefit from the same type of personal interaction.
3. What is your educational background?
Jenna received her undergrad in Bachelor of Science in Nursing from UMass Dartmouth, focusing on community assessment, program development, interventions, and evaluation with a concentration on social justice, human rights, and maternal child health.
She is also working on her Master’s in Public Health from Boston University!
4. Teaching Background:
Jenna joined ACLS Academy in 2018 after working with Shelley Lynch on a public health mission in Haiti. She has taught a wide range of classes at ACLS Academy, starting as a BLS and Heartsaver instructor, then once she became a nurse, she began teaching ACLS and PALS. Jenna also started teaching TNCC, ENPC, and STOP THE BLEED last year.
5. What is Jenna's favorite part of teaching?
Jenna loves connecting the dots for her students, especially those already practicing the techniques and skills but aren't clear as to why something is done a certain way, what this algorithm really means, etc. It's seeing and hearing the "A-HA" recognition moment from the student where everything makes sense about why we're teaching this and why we do what we do. Another cool experience Jenna had was with a student who was developing a medical app for hospital employees. The class got to test it for them, trying it in real time as we went through the course to refine and fine-tune the code!
6. Why Does Jenna Love Working at ACLS Academy?
There is a real family feel about the ACLS Academy and a wide variety of students participating in the classes. There are students, physicians, and other practitioners who have been in the field for years and years, and it's nice to have people share their own varied experiences; to bounce around different backgrounds, whether personal or professional, with each other.
7. What is Jenna's Training Secret Sauce:
Class interaction. Jenna tries to ask a lot of questions and engage people and encourage them to share their stories and their knowledge, what they've seen done before in practice so that the group can talk about it and have a conversation instead of just a lecture. Jenna also likes to make it as fun as possible, telling jokes she's been throwing in since 2018. They still get a good chuckle out of people every time, so Jenna keeps them to keep her classes fun and engaging!
8. Jenna shares her Interest in Global Health.
In nursing school for her community nursing rotation, UMass Dartmouth partnered with Partners in Development in Ipswich, MA, which built a health care clinic in Port Au Prince, Haiti. As a junior nursing student, Jenna went to Haiti with Partners in Development, where she met Shelley, who served as the nurse practitioner on the team. Haitians ran the Haiti clinic, and the team was there for nine days, generally assisting and facilitating the Well Child exams. This experience sparked Jenna's public health interest, knowing we can help bridge the gap in healthcare access and the social determinants of health (SDoH) overall. The following year, as a senior nursing student, Jenna visited another Partners in Development location, this time in Glendora, Mississippi, to assist at the clinic and returned as a nurse after graduating from UMass. Both these experiences, particularly visiting Mississippi, made Jenna realize that even the United States had not addressed many problems preventing people from accessing healthcare or the social determinants of overall health. That sparked her commitment to helping every chance she gets.
9. Jenna’s favorite thing when she isn’t working, teaching, or at school is pursuing her Masters.
In the rare event Jenna is not working or studying, Jenna is traveling or reading. She particularly likes to go places where she can explore, hike, and experience the local culture. One of her favorite places she’s visited was Costa Rica. It was a mission trip for education, where the group was tasked with educating a local community. They could also explore the area and feel integrated into the community and culture.
We wish Jenna well in all her adventures and educational endeavors. The world is a better place with Jenna in it!