Amanda Moore, NUR ’26, Poughkeepsie, NY
This summer I had the amazing opportunity to participate in a nursing externship at the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. For 10 weeks, I shadowed multiple nurses and got the chance to work in two different inpatient units, gaining an in-depth understanding of pediatric acute care. I spent my first 5 weeks in the Emergency Department (ED) and the second 5 weeks in the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU).
While both of the units offered me a view into the critical care world of nursing, they could not have been more different. The Emergency Department is a fast-paced, high-energy environment. It was not unusual for my nurse and I to see over 10 patients a day, each with vastly different needs. Patient cases there range from children with common cold symptoms to ambulance rescue patients coming from a motor vehicle accident or other trauma. My experience in the ED forced me to think on my feet, respond quickly to urgent changes, and prioritize stabilizing a patient rather than diagnosing and treating a condition. This unit was a nice change of pace from my mandatory clinicals in the Nursing School, offering me the chance to experience unpredictable, adrenaline-driven situations.
In the PICU, almost all the patients were in critical condition. Many children were connected to ventilators or intubated and were continually being administered life-saving medications and specialized treatments. In the PICU, I found I was thinking quite a bit more and asking deeper clinical questions. Why is this patient getting these medications? Is this specific treatment the best option? What are the next steps in their care plan? Some patients in the PICU have been there for many months, and I really valued the chance to see patients and their families for multiple shifts in a row. This continuity gave me the opportunity to gain trust from family members, learn about the emotional side of long-term hospitalization, and give patient-family education about new diagnoses or medications.
Essentially, I felt like a real nurse during this externship! All of the nurses I worked with allowed me to help provide patient care. This included taking vital signs, performing patient hygiene and skin care, assisting with transportation, evaluating head-to-toe physical assessments, as well as helping other nurses on each unit with their patient care. I am confident that my externship helped me to improve my hands-on nursing skills, sharpened my clinical reasoning, and strengthened my ability to work alongside other nurses and healthcare staff such as physicians, PT, OT, child life, and nutrition teams. This experience deepened my passion for pediatric nursing, and I am extremely grateful for the financial assistance given by Penn Career Services, allowing me to pursue this life-changing, and career-confirming, experience!
This is part of a series of posts by recipients of the 2025 Career Services Summer Funding Grant. We’ve asked funding recipients to reflect on their summer experiences and talk about the industries in which they spent their summer. You can read the entire series here
