WSNA Convention 2025, Forward Together, ​‘right message for our time’

At WSNA’s 2025 convention, themed ‘Forward Together,’ our community saw what’s possible when we work together.

Taking place over three days on April 30-May 2, the convention included an incredible lineup of speakers and panels, awards recognizing 10 inspiring nursing leaders and community partners, a rousing taiko drum performance, and the voting on a  number of resolutions and bylaws amendments that will set the course for WSNA over the coming two years. WSNA nurses also rallied for nurse scholarships, meeting a donor match of $50,000.

The convention opened with greetings from U.S. Sen. Patty Murray and AFT President Randi Weingarten.

Then, WSNA Executive Director David Keepnews set the tone for the convention with his introductory remarks:

“Our convention theme, Forward Together, is the right message for the time. We are seeing unprecedented attacks on programs and principles we hold dear – rolling back progress on DEI, attacks on the rights to belong to a union. 

It’s easy to feel overwhelmed. It’s important to acknowledge and support each other. This is a time to come together to assert our rights, our patients’ rights, our coworkers’ rights, and the rights of people in our community. But I also want to make something clear. We know that our members hold a wide variety of political views. We want and need to respect that. Our focus is on the issues, not on personalities or political parties. 

Regardless of our political views, we need to emphasize our common interests in defending the right to collective bargaining and our common interest in defending Medicaid. We have a common interest in insuring care for all our patients regardless of their race, ethnicity, immigration status, sexual orientation, or gender identity,

We have a common interest in striving for a more equitable healthcare system.”

Keepnews introduced WSNA President Justin Gill, DNP, ARNP, RN, who reviewed WSNA’s progress toward our priorities in the areas of safe staffing, safer workplaces, securing better contracts, deepening involvement in the labor movement, increasing our political presence, and advancing diversity, equity, and inclusion. He also noted the challenges facing the profession, particularly in light of threats by the current administration to federal healthcare funding, DEI, and collective bargaining. Returning to the convention theme, he posed the following question:

“When we look back 10, 20, 30 years down the road, we will ask ‘Did we stay quiet, or did we meet this moment and lead with a strong conviction in our nursing values?’ If our association’s history is any guide, we will be able to say we stood up courageously in the face of uncertainty and instability, just as we have at the bedside and in every challenge that has confronted our profession in the past.  

“We know how to communicate and connect, and we know how to make meaningful changes in every level of our healthcare system and society.  

“So, let’s move forward together.”

During General Assembly, members approved 28 bylaws amendments for vote in the 2025 WSNA elections and passed three resolutions:

1. Launching a pilot program to admit LPNs as WSNA members.
2. Defending the rights of workers to bargain collectively.
3. Reaffirming WSNA’s commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion. The last was passed by unanimous vote.

The meeting also unanimously approved a motion asserting WSNA’s support for immigrant rights and fair treatment.

The Local Unit Council, consisting of representatives from 27 WSNA local bargaining units, met on the first evening of the convention. They came together to learn from each other and celebrate WSNA’s growth in collective bargaining. They shared successes, challenges, and goals, and discussed plans for strengthening local units and solidifying relationships with regional Central Labor Councils. Two leading staff members from AFT, WSNA’s national union, were in attendance: Acting Director of Health Issues Haley Quinn and Director of Healthcare Organizing Jessica Foster.

“The convention was a celebration of WSNA’s growth and accomplishments," said Gill. “At the same time, we recognized many of the present and future challenges that we must overcome.”

Gill said the challenges of our time require courage and bold action, which is something that WSNA has embraced since its founding in1908.

Speakers talked about the power of nurses to lead change.

“Nurses should be everywhere advocating for everything,” said ANA President Jennifer Mensik Kennedy, PhD, MBA, RN, NEA-BC, FAAN, who spoke on ANA’s progress on legislative priorities. “Belonging to an association is the bedrock of democracy. If we are not involved, then we don’t have democracy.”

Jessica Hauffe, WSNA Director of Government Affairs and Sami Bailey, WSNA’s Political Advocacy Specialist, talked about WSNA’s successes and continuing challenges, which are contained in their 2025 End of Session Report.

Monica McLemore, PhD, MPH, RN, who did a two-part presentation on health equity, said she was optimistic that the nation can “build back different.”

She said if nurses were in charge of the country, they would be asking, “What’s the plan?” “How are we going to give people a dignified life and a dignified death?”

The convention looked at the big issues facing nurses — safe staffing, health equity, workplace violence, and nursing issues at the federal and state level.

Below are some of the lessons learned during these sessions:

Ali R. Tayyeb, PhD, RN, NPD-BC, PHN, FAAN, a U.S. Navy veteran and host of the RN-Mentoring podcast, inspired attendees to examine ways they can chart their own course for personal and professional growth and career advancement. 

Tayyeb said that a team is not about the individual or personal ego, but he said there is a very small i, which represents the following:

• Inclusivity: "You use your power as nurses to influence shaping the healthcare system before us."
• Intention: "If you don’t have intention, something is missing."
• Initiative: "Somebody needs to take initiative and the courage to step forward closing the gaps."
• Impact: "You should provide impact in the communities you are serving."

He stressed the importance of professional development so nurses can be better prepared to take care of the communities they serve.

“All of you should have mentors. All of you should have mentees,” he said. “Find people you think are interesting. You are going to have to go through a lot of people to find the right mentor for you. It’s not just one mentor. Right now, I have four formal mentors. Different mentors for different reasons. Career mentors, life mentors, peer mentors, situational mentors.”

He said it’s also important to cultivate sponsors — people who will speak your name and open doors for whatever direction you want to go.

“Sponsors need to know what your goals are and what you are capable of,” he said. “If people don’t know about you, they are not going to speak your name.”

Cynthia Clark, PhD, RN, ANEF, FAAN, founder of Civility Matters, and a prolific researcher on improving work environments, spoke on creating a culture of civility, community, and joy in nursing.

Clark said we choose how we respond to people, and true civility is choosing to engage respectfully when contrary opinions or opposing views are expressed.

Clark said she is often asked, “What can I do to add value to an organization or team?” She said it is essential we deepen our emotional intelligence. She quoted author and poet Vironika Tugaleva, “To know yourself, you must sacrifice the illusion that you already do.” 
 
Clark said people tend to have a different sense of themselves than others, such as giving themselves high scores for civility, while coworkers ranked them differently.

She created the Clark Workplace Civility Index, a set of 20 questions. Clark suggests taking the test by answering if 90 percent of the time, you act this way and then have someone answer their thoughts of you.

She said the questions that get the most no's are avoiding negative gossip and not always speaking directly to the person we have an issue with.

The field of civility has grown greatly since the publication of Choosing Civility in 20022 by the later P.M. Forni, the former director of the Civility Project at Johns Hopkins University.

Civility in the workplace is being looked at by large organizations, including the National Academy of Medicine, which created the National Plan for Workforce Well Being in 2022.

MIT Sloan Management synthesized a meta-analysis on how to fix unhealthy work environments and called for workplaces to have norms and team agreements on the kinds of behavior they respect and value.

The American Association of Critical-Care Nurse has six standards for sustaining healthy work environments.

The workplace violence panel featured Katie Blanchard, PhD-c, MSN, NPD-BC, CNE, CPP, who channeled her trauma from a horrific workplace injury by a coworker into action. Blanchard is director of nursing for the Behavioral Healthcare Administration at Washington State Department of Social and Health Services and a powerful force in preventing workplace violence. All panel members shared tips on preventing workplace violence.

Blanchard emphasized that workplace violence is verbal, psychological, and physical.

She said she wanted to share her story as a lesson for nurses.

As a young Army nurse in 2015, Blanchard was appointed the assistant chief nurse for an outpatient hospital setting in Ft. Leavenworth, Kansans. She was told she would be dealing with a difficult employee who has yelled and screamed at patients, and that she needs to fix it.

She said the violence escalated over the next year by him throwing things, cornering her, and spitting on her. Although she filed complaints, she was told nothing could be done because she hadn’t been harmed. She said she felt like a sitting duck but that she couldn’t quit because it was the Army.

One night, her attacker waited outside of her office, doused her with gasoline, set her on fire, and stabbed her. She said she screamed for help, and two practitioners guarded her from ongoing attacks.

“I feel very lucky I have survived,” she said. “Those scars this trauma carries forward are not just mine, but the nursing community. We can do better.”

She offered the following suggestions for preventing workplace violence:

• Educate workers that workplace violence can be verbal, psychological, and physical. “If my colleagues knew more about workplace violence, there could have been a lot of changes,” she said.
• Identify when someone is being bullied.
• Put in safety nets, such as an escort to a car.
• Take all threats seriously. “My co-worker sent an email the night before I was attacked saying he was going to take care of me. No actions were taken.”

Panel members Eppie Williamson, MSN, RN, UW Medicine, and Pat Ellis, crisis intervention coordinator, also offered their tips.

• Williamson said she and her coworkers have dealt with a lot of verbal violence because they are often on the phone with patients. Now, six clinics at UW are involved in a project addressing verbal violence through MyChart and the phone. She said workers have tools to help de-escalate a conversation and end a call by saying, “Please change your behavior or I’m going to end this conversation.”
• Ellis stressed the importance of self-care. He said nurses are chronically exposed to drama on a daily basis and tend to brush it off because it’s part of the job.

“Anytime you witness, address, or see trauma, it’s going to impact your life. It doesn’t matter your personality style,” he said. “You have to talk about it. You need to process emotional impacts.”

And panel member Haley Quinn, Acting Director of Healthcare Issues for AFT, told the audience that they are joined with a quarter of a million healthcare workers in the union.

“You have a team that has your back in D.C.,” she said.

Quinn’s role is to ensure that the national union is responsive to the needs of AFT’s healthcare members.

She discussed AFT’s Code Red campaign, a national initiative to advance safe staffing and workplace violence prevention. Code Red supports state-level initiatives by AFT healthcare affiliates (including WSNA). It provides opportunities to share common experiences across states and to coordinate as AFT healthcare workers score successes through legislation and collective bargaining. Quinn drew connections between understaffing and workplace violence and pointed out that part of the problem with workplace violence is a “lack of will to act” on the part of many employers.

She encouraged nurses to share their stories: “Our job is to empower you to share those stories and then to give you the tools you need” to advocate solutions.

Monica McLemore, PhD, MPH, RN, a visiting professor at NYU Rory Meyers College of Nursing, an affiliate professor at the UW School of Nursing, and editor in chief of Health Equity Journal, gave a rousing lecture on why health equity should be our roadmap for nursing the nation.

McLemore said that there are many different definitions of health equity, but cited Dr. Camara Jones, past president of the American Public Health Association. Jones defines health equity as “setting the conditions for optimal health for all people.”

“The real question is how serious are we about achieving health equity because clearly we are allowing for preventable death, which is not OK,” said McLemore.

She said the current administration has shown how quickly change can happen, and if the entire scientific enterprise of the nation could be brought to its knees in a few months, then clearly something is not working.

“How many people like me see our current moment as an interesting opportunity and a catalyst for transformation?” she said, "I don’t [just] want to build back better. I want to build back different.”

McLemore said the American Nurses Association’s 2025 newly released Code of Ethics provides a roadmap on how to move forward for a better tomorrow.

“We work with our professional organizations to enact resources, policies and legislation to promote social justice, eliminate health inequities, and facilitate human flourishing. We build collaborative relationships and network with nurses and other healthcare and nonhealthcare disciplines and the public to achieve greater ends.”

She said it’s time for nurses to take the lead.

“This (code of ethics) is a mandate. This is a roadmap. This is a signpost for us to collectively get together and help nurse the nation through what we are going through.”

McLemore said major healthcare reform is needed, including nurse-led case management and more investment in quality-improvement initiatives developed by nurses.

The Safe Staffing panel brought together three perspectives: Carl Backen, MPA, standards manager with the Washington State Department of Labor & Industries, to discuss meal and rest breaks, Tiffany Buck, MPH, MS, ARNP, RN, from the Department of Health, to talk about  safe staffing, and David Keepnews, PhD, JD, RN, FAAN, executive director of WSNA, to talk about both.

They said one big benefit of the new staffing law is that it brought together the Department of Health and Department of Labor and Industries to take a more holistic look at the issues facing the healthcare sector, panelists said.

They also noted major challenges ahead.

The staffing law, as a result of a compromise, is nuanced and needs both the hospitals and nurses to see it through, said Keepnews.

Keepnews said some facilities are working with nursing staff collaboratively to work toward safe staffing, while others are putting up roadblocks or seeking just minimal compliance.

“This isn’t where we started out. We started out [proposing] clear and enforceable staffing standards,” he said. “If we find that that commitment and mutual collaboration aren’t there, then we need to be ready to return to [advocate] what additional steps are needed.”

Backen said HB 1879 (a bill concerning meal and rest breaks for hospital workers passed in the 2025 state legislative session effective Jan. 1, 2026) introduces a new concept — a rest break timing waiver. Previously, meal breaks could be waived, but timing of rest breaks could not be. (Waivers must be voluntary and agreed to by both the employee and the hospital).

“If you work 12 hours, the employer is still required to give you all three rest breaks, but you can agree on the timing,” he said.

Among the Q&A with panelists, was the following question: “If you could look into a crystal ball, what problems with compliance could you predict with these laws?”

Keepnews noted current threats to healthcare funding, including proposed Medicaid cuts, and said that employers might use these to try to push back on staffing.

Backen said one of the major issues is second meal breaks being required and the timing of those breaks. He said the new law on rest break waivers will also be a challenge.

Buck said the authority for enforcement of the staffing law will roll out in stages. While the Department of Health has required hospitals to submit their charters and staffing plans, enforcement of the staffing plans begins until July 1.

Panelists encouraged nurses to familiarize themselves with their rights and entitlements under the laws and to document anything that doesn’t seem right.

“Even if you are not sure if something is a violation of the law, document it. It’s worth its weight in gold for workplace investigation,” said Backen.

Find out more about the resolutions and motion passed at General Assembly, WSNA’s highest decision-making body. The work at General Assembly sets WSNA's future.