School Nurses International (SNI) is an international congress for school nurses, which is held every other year since 1981. During the congress, research within the field of health ware presented,  and participants were given the opportunity to network and share experiences. This year, 165 school nurses from 24 countries around the world participated, including school nurses from Iran, the United States, Bangladesh, Slovenia, Cambodia, the Netherlands, Japan, Norway, and Sweden. This year was the 20th time!

Our school nurse Gunilla Serlén, who works at Viktor Rydberg’s Vasastan School, has participated in the congress five times. This year, she was involved in organizing the congress, as 165 school nurses were invited to Sweden and Stockholm to join congress.

–  One gets the pleasure of meeting colleagues from so many different countries. Everyone works with health in different ways, depending on which country they are based in, but common to all is the health and wellbeing work. During the congress, we focused on WHO’s work for ”making every school a health-promoting school, says Gunilla.

Gunilla is an accomplished school nurse with over 30 years of experience who participates in and develops Victor Rydbergs Schools’ systematic quality work within EMI. She is also a mentor for new school nurses starting with us. Although each school nurse performs the work individually at each school, we have a strong team of school nurses within VR and work often together.

– The school nursing Congress is now over, and it feels a little sad. Three school nurses who were here from Ethiopia, Cambodia and Nepal received scholarships to travel. Some school nurses had never been outside their home countries, Gunilla says.

The foundation’s vision is to be at the forefront in all areas of the Swedish education system. We are proud to see that Gunilla and our other school nurses in VR work illustrates our vision.