When Elise Nganou was in high school, she was responsible for hundreds of girls younger than she was.

At boarding school in her native Cameroon, she was the head girl. She made sure the others went to class and followed the rules, but she knew her job didn’t end there.

“When someone was sick, I was like, ‘I will take care of you. Let’s go to the infirmary,’” Nganou said.

That experience proved influential when she started thinking about a career. Nganou originally thought she wanted to pursue journalism, but when she returned to the United States—she divided her childhood between the U.S. and Cameroon—she had a change of heart. Despite never thinking she was good at science, she decided to pursue nursing.

“What other profession can I go into where I know, 100%, that I’m going to be taking care of people?” Nganou said.

Nganou began taking prerequisite courses for nursing programs at Frederick Community College in Maryland, where her family lived. At the same time, she started working at a nursing home, where she learned the basics of taking care of others.

Nganou had planned to attend the nearby University of Maryland to earn her nursing degree, but a Google search for nursing programs turned up the University of Virginia School of Nursing’s accelerated bachelor’s degree transfer program. Most nursing bachelor’s programs take four years of full-time study; UVA’s new program takes just two years of intensive full-time study.

Although she’d never heard of Charlottesville, Nganou applied. After taking in some student takeovers of the Nursing School’s Instagram page, it seemed more inclusive, she thought, and she’d be able to get started on her nursing career sooner. She applied to other programs, but UVA had won her over; when she got the news she’d been accepted, she called her mom to celebrate.

“It was the best decision I’ve ever made,” Nganou said.

UVA has been very supportive, she added. Though she was overjoyed when she was accepted to the nursing school, the idea of taking out a $20,000 loan for her nursing education was daunting. Nursing School advisers, however, put together a financial aid package for her that cut her financial burden by more than half.

That support has continued throughout her time at UVA. Nganou speaks French as her native language, and sometimes needs professors to rephrase things or speak more clearly. They always oblige.

“I’ve had such a good experience, and you don’t hear that all the time,” Nganou said.

Once she finishes her studies, Nganou hopes to become a labor and delivery nurse. She wants to make sure that Black mothers in this country—who die in labor at higher rates than their white counterparts—are taken seriously and taken care of. Then she wants to go back to Cameroon and start her own birthing center.

Nganou said in Cameroon, it’s more common for people to go to a pharmacy with their symptoms. They usually get diagnosed with malaria, even if they’re sick with something else. A story about a Cameroonian woman who died, in part because health workers ignored her pain, made Nganou want to ensure it never happened to another woman.

She knows what lies ahead of her is hard, but she feels prepared for it.

“Nursing takes a toll,” Nganou said. “But it’s beautiful to be a nurse.”