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Todd Walton, who graduated on Thursday from the College of Nursing’s Kearney Division, spent twelve years pursuing his degree. Walton’s efforts to earn his diploma were slowed by full-time work as a Kearney firefighter and National Guard deployments to Iraq, Kuwait and New Orleans. |
But after the ceremony, which concluded a 12-year stint in college to get his degree, Walton was able to add registered nurse to his list of titles that includes fireman and soldier.
Some friends joke about how long it took him to get through school.
“They say, ‘A lot of people go to school for 12 years, but they’re called doctors,'” Walton said.
It’s not like he chose to do things this way. But on the way to earning his degree, Walton became a full-time firefighter and has been serving 16-years in the military.
He’s worked full time the entire time he attended college in order to support his family. He’s also been deployed twice by the National Guard, serving in Iraq, Kuwait and New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina.
In the past several months, he’s endured 84-hour weeks between nursing school work and the fire department.
At times, the lines between his multiple roles blurred.
One day, Walton — who normally took leave to attend class — drove a fire truck to campus.
On this day, no one was able to cover for him at the fire station so Walton remained on duty and went to his 45-minute class. He told his instructor if his pager went off, he would have to go.
Luckily, his pager didn’t go off until after class ended.
Walton’s call to be a nurse came while serving in the U.S. Army from 1990 to 1994 where he saw the role of nurse practitioners.
“I thought it was pretty interesting,” Walton said. “They were seeing patients, writing scripts (prescriptions). I asked them about it and they told me to start by being a registered nurse and go from there.”
After his enlistment ended, he joined an Army National Guard unit in Kearney and enrolled in the University of Nebraska at Kearney in January 1995. He was ultimately accepted in the UNMC bachelor’s in nursing degree program at the College of Nursing’s Kearney Division.
His plans were interrupted in January 2003, however, when he was deployed to Iraq and Kuwait for 12 months. Two years later, in September 2005, he was activated for one month to serve in support of Hurricane Katrina recovery efforts.
Walton doesn’t know yet whether he’ll pursue being a nurse practitioner at this time.
“I’ve had a lot going on in the last three to four years. After going to school for 12 years, I’m sort of burned out from it,” he said. “When I got the full-time job as a firefighter in 2004, I thought about not finishing school, but then I’d hate myself. For now, I’m just working and paying the bills.”
Walton credits his family, friends, colleagues, nursing faculty and instructors in helping him get his degree. His wife, he said, gets special credit for helping him become a registered nurse.
“I thank my loving and supporting wife who has bore the brunt of a lot of household duties and taking care of the kids. With my schedule, there are a lot of times I’m not home,” he said. “She stood by me the whole time and I love her. She’s the big reason I finished.”
Walton’s family was pretty excited about his graduation — even if it did take him 12 years to get there.
“I just wanted to graduate before my daughter graduated from high school,” he said.